• Vallkor

Re: [Pandora's Plea]

Is mana an issue to the point that most would weigh down a trinket slot for something like this? I just don't see it. That's not to say I won't pick one up in the event that the Int is actually needed, but for most everything else I would much rather have 2 solid throughput trinkets equipped (IotDS/Scale of Fates).

Re: Set bonuses

Still not a fan of the riptide one. I do use it nearly on cooldown as it is, but having a 2pc be responsible for 1 second off the cooldown just seems like a waste. As for the 4pc, I find it interesting that it would open the door for more crit gear. If anything, I see it as a pretty significant boost to CH itself in addition to a gearset revolving around high haste/SP. It just seems counter productive to gain .2 off and then gear crit in other slots.

 

• locriani

Assuming the [Pandora's Plea] follows a 1PPM model with a 45s ICD, it provides ~141.7 SP + 17.8 SP; a total of 159.5 SP. This is very much a throughput trinket, and very likely a best in slot.

For comparison:

Stats:	[Pandora's Plea]	[Scale of Fates]	[Illustration of the Dragon Soul]
Intellect:	108	0	0
Haste:	0	72	0
Crit:	71.3	0	0
effective Mp5:	64.8	0	0
effective SP:	159.5	125	200

 

Altsobadoli

Yes I am iffy about Riptide bonus too. Would have been nice yesterday on Hodir though. Also, it would be great just for the benefit of keeping up tidal waves constantly without having to throw a chain heal: RT+HW+HW+RT+HW+HW etc instead of RT+HW+HW+CH+HW+HW.

As for the 4 set, perhaps I should have been more clear. Many of the newer BIS items as far as spell power goes from ulduar have crit and not haste. It would be great to equip these without having to worry about CH losing haste. I like to keep its cast time under 2 seconds.

I will miss the hell out of t7 set bonuses though. I'm wondering if anyone has done the work to find out if full t8.5 increased spell power etc. adds up to an equivalent of or greater than the 4set t7.5 bonus. It seems the increase in total spell power is much greater than 5% from t7 to t8, so it would follow that it is worth it to abandon t7 in favor of t8.

 

• Vallkor

I still don't agree with that. The math is certainly right assuming that you get full benefit from it. Have it proc during a transition or any other downtime and the effectiveness drops dramatically. In comparison to an Illustration (static 200sp with near 100% uptime) and Scale (125 sp w/ 100% uptime and a very noticeable haste boost for bursty situations), this isn't even close in regards to raw throughput. It's still not a proc you can control, I'd much rather have a haste click for something like Mimiron P2 then have this equipped just to see it proc during the P2>3 transition.

 

Dummy

It looks like they fixed that and it is only one effect u can benefit from

and i tried to use the Soul Preserver but it looks like they nerfed the procing, atlest thats what i obseverd, any feedback ?

 

Skyhoof

I updated the Best in Slot table on page 11 of this thread: [Resto] 3.1 PTR changes and testing

Also, could someone set me straight on which bosses drop the tier pieces. Is this correct?
Gloves = Mimiron
Chest = Hodir
Head = Thorim
Legs = Freya
Shoulders = Yogg-Saron (plus a chance to drop other tier pieces)


Most definitely. Added to table.

Yes, BIS for a crit ring. Added to the list.

Yep

Gotta love a ring with a gem slot. Added. Also listed Sanity's Bond as a runner-up in the mp5 category. It's still hard to beat Pyrelight Circle.

Take another look at the table. Guiding Star is already on there. I have since added [Soulscribe] to the non-mp5 slot.

Agreed. Added to list.

Added to the list of trinkets.

Also added a non-mp5 neck: Pendant of the Shallow Grave from Thorim-10-Hard

 

• Vallkor

That list is accurate. I don't think anyone has received anything other than 2xShoulders off of Yogg-Saron though.

 

AlphaJew

You sure? My group received a pair of T8 legs off of 10-man Hodir last night.

(edit) my bad, that list is correct for 25 man, I think. Kind of strange that they mixed up which pieces drop from where between 10 and 25 man.

 

Jessamy

[Robes of the Umbral Brute] has nearly identical stats.

 

Sixthy

They need to drop the Riptide 2 piece and replace it with the 5% HW/CH (or even LHW) bonus (it's been our set bonus for two tier's of gear - might as well keep it around and just throw it on the 2 piece).

I do like the new 4 piece, though.

 

• Vallkor

Yeah, I was going to post that the list was exclusive to Ulduar25, but I thought that would be redundant (best in slot will be 25).

As far as I know, 10 man works out:

Hodir - Legs
Thorim - Shoulders
Freya - Gloves
Mimiron - Helm
Yogg-Saron - Chest

 

Katsira

I really like the 2 piece, but the 4 piece isn't very impressive. I've been using LHW and Riptide more than CH due to the room sizes and raid spread. I won't be getting 4 piece, but will nab the chest/legs and get the alternate pieces for the rest because of this. The other set pieces will sit in my bank until I see that CH is needed 100% of the time outside of Kologarn and XT.

I think preference is dictated by raid healing structure more than anything else.

 

Sixthy

No - it's dictated by raid positioning, and if CH isn't effective for your raid then you're not positioning to make it so. That's pretty much the end of that story. Riptide and LHW are very good situational heals and I use them very effectively, but CH is still the king of the spammers and there's pretty much no fight in Ulduar that you can't effectively use it on.

 

AlphaJew

I found that with the way we did Ironaya, it was hands down the best fight I've done so far for CH. We just cram everyone in a corner, put a shammy in each group for Tremor, and just move slightly along the wall for the void zones. Stacking up like that prevents the interrupt+school locks from the kitties, and makes healing on that fight a no-brainer. Target your tank, find your Chain Heal button, and facerollllllllll.

Excepting certain parts of fights like Razorscale's air phases, I've found that Chain Heal -can- be effective. It largely depends on how the -rest- of your group plays. Your group needs to be conscious of the face that you are a Shaman, and your token ability is Chain Heal. Running around like headless chickens is acceptable when it's a paladin healing you. It's not with a shaman. Make sure your group realizes that and adjusts accordingly. I've been struggling immensely with that so far in Ulduar, even just in 10-man, but I think my guildmates are starting to catch on.

 

Sunchips

Not just can, It needs to be effective. When you start getting into hard modes or just harder fights like Mimiron, riptide and lhw (or more appropriately rip HWHW) spam is not going to provide the necessary HPS. Just echoing what you alluded to in the rest of your post, you have to make your raid realize they're doing it wrong. There's no reason to be spread out 15 yards a person on council when you only need 4 or 5 yards. There's no reason to make a full 360 degree circle on XT or Mimiron p2 when you can form ranged clumps instead.

 

Torrential

My guild, despite me being the GM, demanded we change mimir strats to something a lot less friendly to CH. I simply took up another job and asked other healers to do cover what I had been doing. The only fight chain heal has been useless for is Razor, and that fight is too easy to matter.

I saw somebody ask about if mana was an issue to the point where they would devalue trinket. To that let me say this: I healed a Mimi attempt, through about 90% of phase 4 (where we wiped due to failures on land mines and laser barrage) with five pieces of broken gear. I know, I'm dumb. Regardless, I spammed melee through all of P2 and P4 and did my job on P3. I was never in danger of running out of mana. Mana is simply a non issue for resto shaman.

As for our 2 piece bonus I suggest you heal 10 man Mimi. You'll beg for the 2 piece bonus. I know I did.

There was a reason before they nerfed XT. And there is a reason on Mimi. If you're a shaman you should be healing melee on Mimi if you want to use a full circle for ranged. We found that to work much much better. It took away the perils of Mimi targeting the same ranged ball 2 to 4 times in a row.

 

• Vallkor

It's entirely possible to make a circle around Mimiron and have everyone be within range of CH bounces. With proper positioning, it reduces the damage taken on the raid as much as possible while allowing the most hp/s from CH. The spell truly shines on Mimiron and most everything else in the zone, with the one exception being Razorscale.

For most of Naxx, I always gemmed for pure spell power, with my orange sockets being SP/Int. I'll admit, after some PTR testing, I was actually worried that I would have to do a complete overhaul of my gear to compensate for mana issues. After clearing it last week though and working on some of the hard modes, mana is really irrelevant at this point which is why I asked. Most encounters I can end the fight without using a potion and the times I use tide are more for the convenience of my mages rather than for personal gain. That's why I asked what I did about [Pandora's Plea].

Edit2:

Yeah, ultimately it will come down to individual raids and their healing setups. We typically run with a Shaman heavy healing roster (2xPal/1xPri/1xDru/3xSham) so any positioning we setup takes note of that and ensures we use it to our advantage. For us, it was easier to have a circle spread around him (think proximity mine range) with our Shaman in a 3 point set up. Each Shaman bounces CH into the 3-4 people to his side and the raid profits. It's been touched on elsewhere about the big misconception of CH being inferior in Ulduar has to do with proper positioning and nowhere is that more true than on Mimiron.

 

Torrential

I agree you can make the circle small enough that CH will bounce but at the range we used pretty much only 2 people ever got hit and I just healed Melee (10 people) by myself while priests and a druid did the circle. Worked for us, other things work for others.

 

• Aldriana

Thread closed at the request of thread starter. To quote: