Rather than clutter up the rotation thread, we can have all our discussions (and when I say our, I generally mean you guys as I still have stuff I really should finish writing) about WWS performance, gearing help, etc etc etc

Please remember to read as much of the thread as possible, to avoid covering the same stuff over and over again.

Wow Web Stats
The World of Warcraft Armory

Would love to get this guy's DPS up. He's pretty well geared. I've been looking around and find elemental shaman dps is kinda low anyway, but then again, every bit helps.

Questions in this thread follow the same rules as anywhere else, they're just devoted to elemental DPS how-to.

Read the theorycraft think tank elemental article first. Don't ask impossibly open ended questions, like 'here's a wws and armory, what should change?"

Alright, my question here about gear might slap me in the face but...

I've been following Binkenstein's amazing spreadsheet for gear and have been finding myself rolling on a lot of gear directed for healers once I'm hit capped. Is this an error on my end or just what happens for elemental at a certain point?

Also because I'm playing with the hit cap I'm often stuck with situations like this:

I'm hit capped and Item A is now highly devalues in an EP sense
Item B which I happen to have is an upgrade
If i equip item A it puts me just a tiny bit below hit cap, priorities on gearing change and Item A becomes betyter than Item B

So I'm in a constant repeat with these two items. It also happens with the values of crit and haste at times as well.

I can only think of one best-in-slot item for Ele which has spirit or mp/5 on it, assuming that is what you mean by "healer gear".

Otherwise, if you are just talking about upgrades in general, then assuming you are in blues or ilvl 200 epics, then there will be a fair bit of "healer gear" that represents an upgrade. However you will be hurting both your guild and your own DKP by rolling on it, and only ending up with an item you will want to replace again before Ulduar anyway.

Generally I ignore any fluctuations like that. If item B leaves me under the hit cap, and I can't get over it otherwise, it's not going to get used. However, keep it around, because once you can, you'll use it.

I use two Pawn value sets at the moment, so I can keep track of this sort of stuff.

1. Is item A worth more on Elemental?
2. Is item A worth more on Elemental Hit?

• If yes to 1 & 2, use item A always.
• If yes to 2, but no to 1, use item B only when it keeps you above your hit cap
• If no to 1 & 2, use item B

Most of the time when faced with "healer" gear that is an upgrade, I'll say to the other shaman present "That's an upgrade, but I'll pass for you guys if you want it", and they do likewise with non-mp5 gear.

You are talking about the [Torch of Holy Fire] as being our only MP5 Best in slot correct?

I've had quite a few Shaman try to convince me that our Tier 7 Valor gloves are best in slot, but short of getting cloth, the best mail gloves IMO are the [Benefactor's Gauntlets].

Yes, and yes, I agree.

I am currently using the horrible Heroes gloves, as the benefits of switching to Benefactor's gauntlets are outweighed by the loss from re-gemming and the loss of the -admittedly not huge - T7 4pc bonus. Once I can get my hands on any sort of T7 head I will certainly use Benefactor's.

Personally, I can't justify taking the Torch of Holy Fire until all of our healers have it. It just screams healing weapon to me and frankly, given our current state of affairs, I can wait.

Right now I am still just trying to spend a lot of time figuring out itemization and best in slots to stay at or around 289 hit rating and maximize spell power / haste / crit.

To me it's pretty clear the Benefactor's Gauntlets are BIS. The T7-25 set is BIS for helm, chest, legs and shoulders especially when you take the bonuses into account. A lot of the other slots are up for grabs between a couple things depending on your priorities (ex: Do you really want a shield? How much do you enjoy cloth?)

Just as an exercise in TC, I am pretty sure that assuming you have no anti-cloth prejudice, the absolute best in-slot set would involve ditching a few pieces of T7, and certainly the set bonus. If you were somehow able to get hold of [Leggings of the Wanton Spellcaster] then those legs are really so good on their own that it makes breaking the set worthwhile. Partnered with something like [Mantle of the Corrupted] I think it would certainly be worthwhile.

Practically though, its 4-pc T7 + Benefactor's for me too.

I am actually currently in the unfortunate position of having 2 potentially BIS items sat in the bank for reasons of set bonus/hit cap (Gauntlets + Girdle of Recuperation). Just need the WoW gods to bestow a T7 head + Dying Curse and all that can be put right...

I'm still not sold on the Mark. I have several best in slot with and w/o hit items, and I spent an entire day the other day messing around with gear combinations, and I couldn't find a single combination that made up for the deficit the use ability on the Mark leaves you vs. the proc from [Forge Ember].

Obviously procs are important, but if you can make use of the hit on the Mark it's better than the Ember (hit is going to outperform crit assuming roughly equivalent ilevel). Also keep in mind that having an on-demand boost to your spellpower goes a long way towards evening things out between the two procs (though the Forge Ember's proc is superior over a longer fight). An on-demand SP boost allows you to stack your timers and get more guaranteed mileage out of the boost, whereas a proc happens roughly every 45 seconds regardless of what else is going on.

I've found a convenient way of putting together gear sets: chardev.org - a World of Warcraft Character Planner - x

You can even add any buffs in the game if you like. I've added just the food buff for those cases where, if I'm ~40 hit short of cap, I can add in the +40 hit food.

SEIC v3.0.8.4 shows a total DPS of 5098 for the following set: chardev.org - a World of Warcraft Character Planner - x
I get 5122 DPS with this set using 4pc and Spider trinket instead of Curse: chardev.org - a World of Warcraft Character Planner - x

I get 5141 DPS with 4pc, Wanton, Curse, Titanium Shock: chardev.org - a World of Warcraft Character Planner - x

I think an important gearing question is: What are the cheapest sources of hit? I derived an approximate cost value using SEIC. I chose two competing items (best w/ hit vs. best w/o hit) and totaled their stats to DEP (excluding hit on original item). I then divided by "depspell" converting the terms to spell power. Next, I took the difference between the two items in spell power then divided the result by the Hit on the +Hit item. This gives (I think) the value of the Hit on the original item in terms of the spell power lost by not using the pure DPS item. For example, the Signet of the Malevolent is equivalent to ~68 Spell Power (excluding the hit), whereas the Titanium Spellshock Ring is ~97. You've lost 29 spell power in exchange for 49 Hit. Thus, 29/49, 1Hit = 0.59 SPower

Sources, from cheapest (If completes 4pc):
[Wyrmrest Necklace of Power] instead of [Cosmic Lights] -- Free, it's that good
[Valorous Earthshatter Shoulderpads] instead of [Mantle of the Eternal Sentinel] -- 0.43(Free) SPower
[Leggings of the Wanton Spellcaster] instead of [Leggings of Voracious Shadows] -- 0.28 SPower
[Dying Curse] instead of [Embrace of the Spider] -- 0.33 SPower
[Valorous Earthshatter Gloves] instead of [Benefactor's Gauntlets] -- 0.84(0.36) SPower

These 5 items above provide shamans the cheapest 271 Hit in game(afaik).

[Cincture of Polarity] instead of [Girdle of Recuperation] -- 0.40 SPower
[Signet of the Malevolent] instead of [Design: Titanium Spellshock Ring] -- 0.59 SPower
[Plush Sash of Guzbah](w/19sd) instead of [Girdle of Recuperation] -- 0.74 SPower
[Mark of the War Prisoner] instead of [Sundial of the Exiled] -- 1.09 SPower

+8Hit/+12 Stam -- 1.13 SPower
+40 Hit Food -- 1.15 SPower
+16Hit Gem -- 1.19 SPower
Old Helm Enchant -- 1.24 SPower
Surestrike Glove Enchant -- 1.4 SPower

So if I've done this right, lessons to take away from this would be:

1. The Surestrike enchant is bad.
2. It is better to gear Hit than to use gems/enchants/food.
3. Gearing to ~250 Hit rating (for non-Draenei) and using [Snapper Extreme] is fine if the only alternative is to use more gems.
4. Would be helpful to see a 'stat cost' metric in our favorite websites and spreadsheets, though I've no idea what that should look like.

Caveats: It's very late and I'm no mathematician. There are probably ten ways to achieve better results with less effort.

Armory
WWS

Thinking about replacing the Badge of the Infiltrator with Darkmoon Card: Death but I'm not 100% sure on how that would work out.

Your "dream Set" is pretty close to my dream set. The only difference is I am really liking[Boots of Impetuous Ideals], which would make space for Girdle of Recuperation. They are also BoE so you MITE spot them on the auction house from time to time for some ridiculous amount of gold.

Other then that exactly like my Dream set.

Now if only the Prot helm will drop in 25 man Naxx, Vanquisher has double dropped 4 weeks in a row...Well done blizz 4 classes 1 token..Makes me about as disgusted as 2 girls 1 cup....hmmm

I'm trying to avoid posting too much in this thread, but here's a few things to think about.

• 5 SP > 8 Haste, so swap the Neck/Helm gems
• You're missing an [Eternal Belt Buckle]
• It's better to get blue sockets with hit/stam gems than dmg/stam gems. This is because 19/2 = 9.5, but 16/2 = 8, so if you swapped the two dmg/stam gems for hit/stam, you'd be up 1 SP
• I assume the lack of helm enchant is purely because you just got it and haven't had a chance to enchant it yet. Same with the green gem there.

Just to say I appreciate the advice, and I do have the belt buckle, it just refuses to show up on Armory

If any of the JCs on my server ever show some interest in making money, I will certainly track down some Vivid gems for the blue slots. Those boots also look interesting, although I can't see them regularly reaching the AH for a while.

The World of Warcraft Armory

With this gear i went up 400dps vs t7 gear( i assume it was because of the 4p bonus)
Dont got a wws, but my dps was around 2.3k with "80 gear" and 2.7k with the t6

Am i doing something wrong with the gear/specc ?(except the lack of good gems/enchants, im aware of that)

Edit: in 10 mans this is, got a bit more in 25 man raids

What say we agree on some parameters for SEIC and have a gear "cage match?"

I'll start with my recommendation:
-No racials, including Draenei aura.
-Use food buffs
-Must have no less than 285 hit (can use hit food though)
-Include version of SEIC used for calc.
-Manually add the proc (only) from chosen trinkets
-No relics until supported by SEIC or agreed-upon models.

Perhaps have a separate category for Draenei and maybe "Mail only."

In all this discussion, I'm just curious how [Gown of the Spell-Weaver] from Maly10 and [Valorous Earthshatter Hauberk] from Naxx25 compare.

To Clarify, as really that's a stupid question, I've gotten the gown, and I've gemmed and enchanted it - I just got benefactor's last night which means I've broken 4pc. Is the 4pc that useful? Or should I ditch the gown in favor of 4pc T7? Having the gown has allowed me to regem for spell dmg.