Goal-driven DPS Optimization - Page 2

Tronak · 10/13/09, 1:09 PM

Hello all, old EJ reader, first time poster. Non-english speaker, I beg you excuse my grammar violations.

Another of these special situations comes into my mind.

Given the following: Twin Val'kyrs Heroic and a Combat Rogue with Dark buff who until now has been DPSing Lightbane wants to maximize output damage on a given Darkbane's shield which just incomes.

Assuming Darkbane and Lightbane are tanked near each other and this rogue has BladeFurry (BF) cooldown available, would it be wise to pop BF and keep targeting/dpsing Lightbane to take profit of Dark buff while hiting Darkbane's shield only thanks to BF? does this advantage exist or BF damage on Darkbane's gets reduced due to the rogue being Dark buffed and this whole post is stupid?

Thanks in advance.

Tinwhisker · 10/13/09, 1:38 PM

Originally Posted by Tronak

Assuming Darkbane and Lightbane are tanked near each other and this rogue has BladeFurry (BF) cooldown available, would it be wise to pop BF and keep targeting/dpsing Lightbane to take profit of Dark buff while hiting Darkbane's shield only thanks to BF? does this advantage exist or BF damage on Darkbane's gets reduced due to the rogue being Dark buffed and this whole post is stupid?

While it may have been possible very early on to do this, it is not currently the case. You will do a decreased amount of damage to the like-colored twin despite not having that twin targeted.

If your raid uses a strategy that involves tanking them together then the Blade Flurry damage isn't wasted by any means. You're just not able to double-dip with it though.

greenjello · 10/13/09, 1:38 PM

Perhaps this is a silly question since I could probably have checked this easily by now using combat parses, but I've heard conflicting info regarding heroic twins. I've always assumed that your blade flurry damage was calculated by simply mirroring your normal damage, but now I'm hearing some people say that your blade flurry damage is subject to the opposite attunement penalty.

Just curious because I frequently do as the original poster on the subject suggested and stay on target during opposite shield phases and hit blade flurry + some additional cooldown. If this blade flurry damage is being mitigated by the attunement penalty then a change in my strategy is in order.

All of this is assuming the Twins are being tanked together.

Zephram · 10/13/09, 2:04 PM

Originally Posted by greenjello

Perhaps this is a silly question since I could probably have checked this easily by now using combat parses, but I've heard conflicting info regarding heroic twins. I've always assumed that your blade flurry damage was calculated by simply mirroring your normal damage, but now I'm hearing some people say that your blade flurry damage is subject to the opposite attunement penalty.

Just curious because I frequently do as the original poster on the subject suggested and stay on target during opposite shield phases and hit blade flurry + some additional cooldown. If this blade flurry damage is being mitigated by the attunement penalty then a change in my strategy is in order.

All of this is assuming the Twins are being tanked together.

Given that way back when in vanilla BF was changed to check armor/mitigation on the seconday target, I'd imagine it would also check for the presence a damage reducing buff on the seconday target. I could be wrong, l'll see if I can test this later in the week, but I'd put money on the penalty still applying.

Tinwhisker · 10/13/09, 2:12 PM

In our normal and heroic 10mans we tank them together, I went back and checked my logs again and confirmed that the Blade Flurry damage to the like-colored twin is significantly lower than the damage to the opposite-colored twin. Here's a few random seconds from the parse:

[00:44:36.953] Tinwhisker crits Fjola Lightbane *2426*
[00:44:37.187] Tinwhisker Blade Flurry Eydis Darkbane 857
[00:44:37.203] Tinwhisker Sinister Strike Fjola Lightbane *7827*
[00:44:37.562] Tinwhisker crits Fjola Lightbane *2164*
[00:44:37.578] Tinwhisker Blade Flurry Eydis Darkbane 1006
[00:44:37.656] Tinwhisker crits Fjola Lightbane *5597*
[00:44:37.984] Tinwhisker Blade Flurry Eydis Darkbane 1157
[00:44:37.984] Tinwhisker Blade Flurry Eydis Darkbane 3731
[00:44:38.218] Tinwhisker hits Fjola Lightbane 870
[00:44:38.421] Tinwhisker Blade Flurry Eydis Darkbane 1032
[00:44:38.515] Tinwhisker Sinister Strike Fjola Lightbane 2860
[00:44:38.718] Tinwhisker crits Fjola Lightbane *5188*
[00:44:38.781] Tinwhisker Blade Flurry Eydis Darkbane 2668
[00:44:38.875] Tinwhisker hits Fjola Lightbane 980
[00:44:39.187] Tinwhisker Blade Flurry Eydis Darkbane 415
[00:44:39.187] Tinwhisker Blade Flurry Eydis Darkbane 1363
[00:44:39.421] Tinwhisker crits Fjola Lightbane *2339*
[00:44:39.593] Tinwhisker Blade Flurry Eydis Darkbane 2473
[00:44:39.640] Tinwhisker Sinister Strike Fjola Lightbane 3003
[00:44:39.812] Tinwhisker crits Fjola Lightbane *5122*
[00:44:40.000] Tinwhisker Blade Flurry Eydis Darkbane 467
[00:44:40.046] Tinwhisker crits Fjola Lightbane *2371*

The highest Blade Flurry hit was 2668 while the highest normal hits were well over 5K. Granted, Blade Flurry hits are normally delayed so it's hard to match them up but it's plain to see that they do not measure up in damage.

Valustria · 10/13/09, 7:04 PM

Originally Posted by Leto

Another thing to consider that has been highlighted by my analysis is just how important autoattacking is while using FoK. With 5 targets for example, I saw the combat potency regen from autoattacking add around 1500 dps.

Make sure to setup your ui to easily indicate whether you are autoattacking or not -- I use a separate mik's pane that scrolls faster than the others.

Alternatively, macro it...

#showtooltip Fan of Knives
/startattack
/cast Fan of Knives

This will guarantee you are constantly swinging at something while spamming FoK.

• Feist-Mok · 10/13/09, 7:43 PM

Originally Posted by Tinwhisker

In our normal and heroic 10mans we tank them together, I went back and checked my logs again and confirmed that the Blade Flurry damage to the like-colored twin is significantly lower than the damage to the opposite-colored twin. Here's a few random seconds from the parse:

The highest Blade Flurry hit was 2668 while the highest normal hits were well over 5K. Granted, Blade Flurry hits are normally delayed so it's hard to match them up but it's plain to see that they do not measure up in damage.

What would be interesting to determine is whether the blade flurry damage 'double dips' from both charges to come out neutral. I.E. Is the damage amplified from one twin, and then reduced by the other, or is it copied before the initial damage amplification is applied - if so, it may not be worth using blade flurry during shields - since you even with blade flurry up, you wouldn't want to give up poison damage on the shielded mob - and instead saving it for Empowers, or simply using it on CD.

Marvie · 10/14/09, 3:16 AM

Originally Posted by Tinwhisker

I went back to last weeks logs and had a look and I think the sample size is just too small to say. Maybe someone else might want to do some testing at some point but I believe they probably do and should have EA put up on them (and the volcanoes as well). Anecdotally, it seems we always get the portals down faster with EA than without. (And yes, I run double wound for these so the Savage Combat debuff goes on and off like crazy in the logs; I included that just in case.)

I've noticed this as well. I haven't taken enough logs to say 100% either way but I have done them with and without EA, the portals with EA seem to die much quicker.

Jeppathum · 10/14/09, 8:05 AM

Originally Posted by Auturgist

Alternatively, macro it...

#showtooltip Fan of Knives
/startattack
/cast Fan of Knives

This will guarantee you are constantly swinging at something while spamming FoK.

I use a macro like this, but it doesn't guarantee anything. It doesn't change target if you go out of range, and for fights like Ony where you might well have her targeted while in the air, it wont change target to whelps when they spawn. Being able to see white damage and have the health bar of the targeted mob highlighted both help to see whether you are autoattacking, and if not where the mob is that you have targeted. Also using an addon like Aloft helped me to see the mob health bars better. I'm not looking forward to Blizz making the health bars overlap, picking out one mob in the group would be horrible with that.

mofidik · 10/14/09, 2:53 PM

By the courtesy of the AJ macro section:

#show sap
/cleartarget
/targetenemy
/cast sap

If my understanding of this macro is correct it functions to drop your target constantly (when mashed) while trying to target someone closer (a stealthing rogue). Altering the macro to perform FoK rather than Sap should do what you'd like it to do.

Leto · 10/14/09, 4:27 PM

After further anlysis of FoK dps, my numbers seem to be indicating the following comparisons between combat (18/51/2) and mutilate (51/18/2) with my gear:

Mutilate starts to outdps combat when you are hitting 8 or more targets.
Mutilate starts to outdps combat without PotW active when you are hitting 3 or more targets.
Mutilate with envenom buff and overkill active doesn't start to outdps combat with adrenaline rush active and
PotW not active until 10 or 11 targets.
Mutilate with envenom buff and overkill active doesn't start to outdps combat with adrenaline rush and PotW active until about 15 targets.

Note that this doesn't compare the dps to your current target, just the AoE dps caused by FoK accounting for the energy regen of each spec while autoattacking with slice and dice up.

Belegûr · 10/15/09, 4:34 AM

Have you taken into account the use of BF in conjunction with FoK? On a fight like Anub, typically, I can have BF up on most of the add phases, which is quite a bit of extra damage. Likewise, on Onyxia, having Blade Flurry up is a massive bonus when your FoK hits for 30-50k.

cerin616 · 10/15/09, 12:37 PM

Originally Posted by Leto

The most important consideration when optimizing dps is often overlooked: the goal of maximizing dps is to increase the likelihood of a raid’s success.

If you have any different types of examples, or theories on what is optimal for a given type of situation, please feel free to contribute.

tl/dr: It is important to consider optimizing all methods of damage delivery, so let’s identify the best ways to optimize damage delivery of each type: burst, sustained, single target, and AoE.

I must say, you sir are quite the gifted rogue. I see too many dps that simply try and make their number as high as possible, right down to using fan of knives against the adds in the Emalon encounter.

Some other things to remember as to what a rogue should be doing, saving cooldowns on things that need to be bursted (which we already specified) and knowing when aoe is more important even if it sacrifices dps. I never really noticed if it even effected anything, but I know that when we do the champions encounter in TOC (10-25) I use wounding poison and mind numbing poison, spend most of my time locking a healer out, and a good deal of time hitting as many targets as i can to spread poisons around. FOK, while it may not be the highest dps anymore, and it certainly won't burst an enemy down, will provide easy poison spread, and will deal a decent aoe damage forcing the healers to spread heals around. I have had people argue that they will still focus the thing we are dpsing down, but I know spending time keeping the paladin locked out he spent a god deal of time trying to make sure the hunter's cat didn't die.

Originally Posted by greenjello

Perhaps this is a silly question since I could probably have checked this easily by now using combat parses, but I've heard conflicting info regarding heroic twins. I've always assumed that your blade flurry damage was calculated by simply mirroring your normal damage, but now I'm hearing some people say that your blade flurry damage is subject to the opposite attunement penalty.

Just curious because I frequently do as the original poster on the subject suggested and stay on target during opposite shield phases and hit blade flurry + some additional cooldown. If this blade flurry damage is being mitigated by the attunement penalty then a change in my strategy is in order.

If you read the tool tip of blade flurry it states, "Attacks hit additional target" meaning it isnt necessarily your damage is being transferred from the one target to the other, but that whatever you cast (sinister strike, eviscerate, etc.) is cast again at a separate target. Therefor any mitigation factors would still apply.

sp00n · 10/15/09, 1:03 PM

Originally Posted by cerin616

If you read the tool tip of blade flurry it states, "Attacks hit additional target" meaning it isnt necessarily your damage is being transferred from the one target to the other, but that whatever you cast (sinister strike, eviscerate, etc.) is cast again at a separate target. Therefor any mitigation factors would still apply.

This is not entirely correct either. A Blade Flurry hit cannot be dodged/parried or crit. If your attack triggering Blade Flurry lands, it will land on the other target as well (especially funny in PvP, when you fight against 2 enemies, one of them being a rogue who popped evasion, and you just hit him anyway due to BF).

What I assume happens is, the base damage before any reductions (armor, absorb?) is saved internally and is then being calculated against the reducing attributes of the secondary target. However, as far as I know, there hasn't been any extensive testing regarding Blade Flurry so far.

animagic · 10/15/09, 4:02 PM

BF was changed ages ago to do just as sp00n said. The second target recieves all the same attacks that hit your primary target, but it uses its own damage reductions to determine the damage done.

Leto · 10/15/09, 5:01 PM

Originally Posted by Belegûr

Have you taken into account the use of BF in conjunction with FoK? On a fight like Anub, typically, I can have BF up on most of the add phases, which is quite a bit of extra damage. Likewise, on Onyxia, having Blade Flurry up is a massive bonus when your FoK hits for 30-50k.

I haven't modeled blade flurry aside from the effects of the speed increase on your energy regen versus the energy cost.

The mechanics of blade flurry with regards to transferring FoK damage would also change its value from fight to fight.

I'd imagine I would wait until some sort of overall damage modeling is done -- either through simulation or if I get bored enough to try and integrate FoK modeling into something else to track overall damage done with various snd maintenance cycles.

Ericmelvin · 10/15/09, 5:38 PM

Originally Posted by sp00n

This is not entirely correct either. A Blade Flurry hit cannot be dodged/parried or crit. If your attack triggering Blade Flurry lands, it will land on the other target as well (especially funny in PvP, when you fight against 2 enemies, one of them being a rogue who popped evasion, and you just hit him anyway due to BF).

What I assume happens is, the base damage before any reductions (armor, absorb?) is saved internally and is then being calculated against the reducing attributes of the secondary target. However, as far as I know, there hasn't been any extensive testing regarding Blade Flurry so far.

Technically, BF procs do not crit, but a crit strike on your main target will show as a non-crit but of the same damage value on the proc victim. The procs just cannot crit separately of your main attacks.

Wodahs · 10/15/09, 6:31 PM

Originally Posted by animagic

BF was changed ages ago to do just as sp00n said. The second target recieves all the same attacks that hit your primary target, but it uses its own damage reductions to determine the damage done.

I think this is incorrect in certain scenario/gimick based fights. Take twins. Assume you have the dark buff, and are attacking the light target. You do extra dmg to the light target due to your buff. If you blade flurry and the dark target is close, you do the same dmg to light and dark. The dark target shouldnt extra dmg as your the same color buffwise, and it is using the buffed dmg value based on the light target.

edit: Apparently I dont read combat logs as well as I thought, the dmg is reduced vs other color targets.

[19:43:15.737] Wodahs Sinister Strike Eydis Darkbane *8313*
[19:43:16.504] Wodahs Blade Flurry Fjola Lightbane 3997
[19:43:16.923] Wodahs Eviscerate Eydis Darkbane *18679*
[19:43:17.697] Wodahs Blade Flurry Fjola Lightbane 8980

animagic · 10/15/09, 7:44 PM

The twins calculate damage seperately by your current color. The same color twin does in fact take significantly less damage then the opposite color twin as you during BF.

Cyrak · 10/20/09, 8:04 PM

We've been doing anub'arak 25hm for a few weeks and just got him last week, I've logged a total of around 75 attempts. For this fight in particular I've been struggling to determine the value of swapping out my 9.5 gloves/shoulders for 8.5 gloves/shoulders and using deadly offhand.

I'm glyphed snd/fok/tott, and as with most rogues I'd imagine, my primary role during the fight is to solidify tank aggro for the adds. I was able to sustain over 10k with 2pc 8.5 wound/deadly with 18/51/2, hns spec axe mainhand and a 258 1.8spd dagger offhand, I was also gemmed straight AP other than yellow socket bonuses/meta. I've since gone back to a softcap setup. The 4pc doesn't really seem to have a very high value in that fight because I rarely build combo points other than to refresh snd (which I do with 1-2cp typically).

This is mostly anecdotal, unfortunately. I was just hoping to get some input on the issue of when, if ever, a deadly offhand with 2pc 8.5 becomes a net bonus for fok spam. This is mostly with regards to anub'arak though. 5 targets seemed to yield good results with this setup, and the burrow phase damage wasn't a huge consideration because I switch offhands for anesthetic.

Leto · 10/21/09, 10:44 AM

With the uncertainty of how wound refreshes savage combat, I'd recommend using one combat rogue with deadly poison anyway, but I hadn't thought to use 2pc t8 with it.

I've done some preliminary adjustments to my spreadsheet and found interesting results. On 5 targets, holding stats equal but setting off hand poison damage to 0, the sustained energy regen(1.67/sec) alone from the 2 piece bonus was enough to yield more dps than using wound, from 8550 to 8570.

Some things I still need to consider:
-Reduction in stats from using 2 piece t8
-Time to get stacks up on all the adds (3 or 4 FoK's should do)
-Damage from deadly poison
-Resist chance on deadly (do individual ticks get fully resisted? I would imagine that would not cause an energy tick?)
-Damage lost to the boss while not FoKing.
-Deadly poison fading from a mob before it can be reapplied.

Either way it looks like something to consider, especially if you have some items that aren't a big upgrade over t8.5.

Mavanas · 10/21/09, 8:13 PM

Switching t9.245 helm and shoulders for t8 helm and shoulders is of the order of 60 dps loss for combat. Another 30 dps or so is lost on sustained dps to the boss, but should be prorated based on time spent on the boss versus FoKing. However, biggest unknown is uptime of savage combat with double wound, until they fix the bug anyway.

sp00n · 10/22/09, 5:24 AM

Originally Posted by Leto

-Resist chance on deadly (do individual ticks get fully resisted? I would imagine that would not cause an energy tick?)

As far as I remember, individual ticks can only be partially resisted. The application of a stack can be fully resisted though.

Relnuruo · 10/22/09, 7:39 PM

Originally Posted by Mavanas

Some things to keep in mind when modeling FOK damage:

3. What energy regeneration to assume. Part of this is whteher autoattacking is on or not, another is whether FOK procs focused attacks and combat potency. There were some 3.2 changes that were related to combat potency and all offhand attacks, but I can't recall whether it applied to FOK. Also only MH attacks procing focused attacks, is that still true?

PUG Ony 25 as Mut, spam FoK with no auto attacks when the first wave of whelps comes out and you will see that FoK ABSOLUTELY procs focused attacks, it is the only time in the game i have ever been GCD limited. I have yet to try this without DP and t8 2pc, but i can spam FoK 2-3 times between DP ticks and still never go below 50 energy.

currently lfg, i'll post a log as soon as possible

Hurluberlu · 10/25/09, 5:52 AM

Originally Posted by Relnuruo

PUG Ony 25 as Mut, spam FoK with no auto attacks when the first wave of whelps comes out and you will see that FoK ABSOLUTELY procs focused attacks, it is the only time in the game i have ever been GCD limited. I have yet to try this without DP and t8 2pc, but i can spam FoK 2-3 times between DP ticks and still never go below 50 energy.

currently lfg, i'll post a log as soon as possible

Made a few tests on the dummies. FoK procs focused attacks only on main hand crits. Auto-attacks and mutilate still proc FA on off-hand crits.