Shaman: Simple Questions/Simple Answers - Page 105

Ragnarox · 10/13/10, 4:34 PM

Originally Posted by Tailgrabber

I've been searching all over, but I can't seem to find a macro for using another spell while the main one is on cooldown. What I mean is with the addition of Lava Surge, I was trying to make a macro to cast Lava Surge, but if it is on cooldown to cast Lightning Bolt instead.

I have tried a cast sequence macro, but that won't take into account when Lava Surge happens.

I've also tried:
/cast Lava Burst
/cast Lightning Bolt

I know I am missing it but I can't seem to find out how to do it.
If it can't be done with a macro, any ideas on an addon that might work if it is possible.

Blizzard is againt any addons or macros that basically play the game for you or allow you to spam one button when you dps. So no, there is no macro that will let you do this. I recommend you get TellMeWhen and add Lava Burst to tell when your Lava Surge procs, or get power auras and have it alert you when you are in combat and Lava Burst is usable.

PDXMarcos · 10/13/10, 4:39 PM

Originally Posted by Tailgrabber

I've been searching all over, but I can't seem to find a macro for using another spell while the main one is on cooldown. What I mean is with the addition of Lava Surge, I was trying to make a macro to cast Lava Surge, but if it is on cooldown to cast Lightning Bolt instead.

I have tried a cast sequence macro, but that won't take into account when Lava Surge happens.

I've also tried:
/cast Lava Burst
/cast Lightning Bolt

I know I am missing it but I can't seem to find out how to do it.
If it can't be done with a macro, any ideas on an addon that might work if it is possible.

Your best option is going to be to set up power auras, or a similar addon, to alert you when lava burst is off cooldown. I was testing the configuration last night and with the change to the spell queueing system I was able to react pretty quickly to the Lava Surge proc. As Ragnarox said above, blizzard does not want a macro or addon to play the game for you.

Amorene · 10/13/10, 6:59 PM

Is there a resource on reforging as it relates to Resto Shamans? Many non-healing members of my raid team are reforging everything to gain the maximum amount of Mastery rating, but I'm not sure it's best for me to give up prime stats to gain a bonus to healing low HP targets. I don't think giving up Int is an option, and I'm very hesitant to give up Crit, as the last HEP reports I ran (very outdated) listed Crit as the second best stat after haste capping (I'm haste capped and 100% i264 gear). Is mana regen really as terrible as I'm reading? Should I be considering reforging.. Spirit? *shudder*

I won't be able to raid until Thursday so I'm just itching to test out healing post-patch.

Dabbler · 10/14/10, 8:47 AM

With the addition of Fulmination, Lightening Shield can now add to damage via extra orbs and Earth Shock. But is it worth it?

With a FS - LvB - LB spam till LvB is ready and refresh FS just before it drops my dps is almost the same as if I add a 6 orb Earth SHock in every 6 LBs (against a dummy anyway). But the mana drain means I need to add in Thunderstorm to keep up mana.

In the long run it seems easier to use Water Shield, leave Earth shock out of the rotation and use the point that would go in Fulmination somewhere else. Am I going to hurt my DPS in long fights by doing that? (ie What is the dps value of the extra mana you get from the Water Shields?)

Thanks.

Grimwolf · 10/14/10, 9:18 AM

I have a simple Question for 4.0.1, not for Beta.

Has anyone compiled a list of EP values for stats. I've scanned the threads here and can't find anything. A link to a topic would be great.

Or a simple agi => spell hit => exp => ... would also help.

Thanks

SupriX · 10/14/10, 9:23 AM

"Lava Lash now Increases the damage dealt by your Lava Lash ability by 20% and no longer requires your weapon to be enchanted with Flametongue."

Does this make WF/WF viable/better? My appologies if there has already been theorycrafting on the subject.

Rouncer · 10/14/10, 9:30 AM

Originally Posted by SupriX

"Lava Lash now Increases the damage dealt by your Lava Lash ability by 20% and no longer requires your weapon to be enchanted with Flametongue."

Does this make WF/WF viable/better? My appologies if there has already been theorycrafting on the subject.

It's just the glyph, lava lash still gets a 40% boost from having flametongue on the offhand.

Moomentum · 10/14/10, 10:24 AM

Originally Posted by Dabbler

With the addition of Fulmination, Lightening Shield can now add to damage via extra orbs and Earth Shock. But is it worth it?

With a FS - LvB - LB spam till LvB is ready and refresh FS just before it drops my dps is almost the same as if I add a 6 orb Earth SHock in every 6 LBs (against a dummy anyway). But the mana drain means I need to add in Thunderstorm to keep up mana.

In the long run it seems easier to use Water Shield, leave Earth shock out of the rotation and use the point that would go in Fulmination somewhere else. Am I going to hurt my DPS in long fights by doing that? (ie What is the dps value of the extra mana you get from the Water Shields?)

Thanks.

Rolling Thunder (prereq talent to fulmination) should be taking care of any mana issues, and will certainly provide more mana than water shield's passive would.

You also aren't going to be able to pick up any particularly compelling PvE talents by dropping Rolling Thunder and Fulmination, especially at 80.

PDXMarcos · 10/14/10, 11:12 AM

Originally Posted by Dabbler

With the addition of Fulmination, Lightening Shield can now add to damage via extra orbs and Earth Shock. But is it worth it?

With a FS - LvB - LB spam till LvB is ready and refresh FS just before it drops my dps is almost the same as if I add a 6 orb Earth SHock in every 6 LBs (against a dummy anyway). But the mana drain means I need to add in Thunderstorm to keep up mana.

In the long run it seems easier to use Water Shield, leave Earth shock out of the rotation and use the point that would go in Fulmination somewhere else. Am I going to hurt my DPS in long fights by doing that? (ie What is the dps value of the extra mana you get from the Water Shields?)

Thanks.

Have you tried it without water shield? You shouldn't have mana issues at all. I did some testing on a dummy Tuesday night and without any external mana regen sources excluding mana spring, I was able to maintain a full rotation for 20 minutes without dipping below 98% mana. Part of the issues is that you may be attempting to ES too often. You should generally wait for a 9 stack of lightning shield before using ES to proc fulmination. Fulmination is very powerful, there were a few times with full raid buffs last night that I was able to do 35-40K damage on a single ES.

Hylas · 10/14/10, 11:25 AM

Originally Posted by Rouncer

It's just the glyph, lava lash still gets a 40% boost from having flametongue on the offhand.

To my knowledge the glyph never required flametongue to give the 20% boost. So I'm reading this as it removes the flametongue limitation for the extra 40% damage on the Lava Lash tooltip. Maybe an effort to make WF/FB the number 1 pvp set up again.

Rouncer · 10/14/10, 11:48 AM

Originally Posted by Hylas

To my knowledge the glyph never required flametongue to give the 20% boost. So I'm reading this as it removes the flametongue limitation for the extra 40% damage on the Lava Lash tooltip. Maybe an effort to make WF/FB the number 1 pvp set up again.

The old glyph was 10% increased lava lash damage IF your offhand was enchanted with flametongue. New glyph is a 20% boost in lava lash damage. Doesn't mention weapon enchants at all and it hasn't since the glyph was changed to 20%.

Let's try reading that little blurb from MMO again.

Glyph
* Lava Lash now Increases the damage dealt by your Lava Lash ability by 20% and no longer requires your weapon to be enchanted with Flametongue.
* Stormstrike now increases the Nature damage bonus of Stormstrike by an additional 10%, up from 8%.

Also the part about the stormstrike glyph is off too. It's still just critical strike chance, not nature damage. Although it's value did increase from 8% to 10% on the beta according to my testing.

Drachii · 10/15/10, 11:15 AM

Fulmination is an interesting looking new talent. I've heard it's been critting for 30k in heroics - which means we have a new hard hitter. (My own max fulmination is epeen-wiltingly small, so I'll pass over that for now) However, this is presenting me with some mathematical headaches of the sort that I, as a not-really-much-of-a-theorycrafter, don't know how to solve.

As follows:
1. Fulmination hits like a train. This makes using it desirable, I'd guess. After some experimenting on dummies, it's apparent that Chain Lightning is a better generator of LS charges than LB - I suspect that each hit on a target has the 60% chance to generate applied independently, so you can get several charges off've one CL. Does this, therefore, mean CL is now back in our regular-casts list for fights involving more than one target? Or more than two? Is there a critical target threshold below which you shouldn't use it and above which you should?

2. Cooldown. I have 'Flame Shock Must Not Fall Off/Clip' ingrained on the inside of my skull by now. However, using ES currently sets FS on a 6sec shared CD, and vice versa - so whenever FS is almost ready to fall off, there's a 12-second window wherein you cannot use Earth Shock. More than once now I've hit 9 charges prior to using FS, resulting in probably-several wasted charges. Is it, therefore, better to Earth Shock roughly 7 seconds or so prior to FS expiring, even with less charges (say, 6 or 7), or should I wait it out for 9 and risk wasting charges?
2b. Is Reverbation at all likely to become a worthy talent due to the above?

I'm not entirely sure these two are 'simple questions', so if people feel they don't belong in this thread I'll happily create a topic or something. I'm still new here when it comes to posting - I normally read. This is, as you may notice, the first time I felt something was worth posting about x.x

Grymoire · 10/18/10, 7:52 AM

Originally Posted by Drachii

Is it, therefore, better to Earth Shock roughly 7 seconds or so prior to FS expiring, even with less charges (say, 6 or 7), or should I wait it out for 9 and risk wasting charges?

I believe it has been said somewhere Fulmination is best use 7-9 charges, which indicate you can, and should, use it with less than 9 charges when it comes to the right situation. For the sake of clipping FS I would say is one of the situation, another one would be during movement, as ES/F now is also ur Frost Shock replacement when it come to casting during movement.

Originally Posted by Drachii

Is Reverbation at all likely to become a worthy talent due to the above?

May be it would change later on, but for now, Rolling Thunder has been able to keep my mana up without any points into Convection, I can come out of most fights with over 95% mana, mana regen rate of RT seems to out weight the mana usage (unless you stop casting LB and cast more shocks and LvB), the other option at 80 would be Earth Gasp, which I missed for Reverb. While it is only 1 sec it helps tighening the gap between FS and ES/F usage.

However this only works for now, I have a feeling once it hit 81+ our mana might start struggling again, but you an always change your talents when it comes to that.

Stelmaria · 10/19/10, 12:55 PM

Math for deciding whether to cast Earth Shock 6 seconds before Flame Shock falls off to avoid wasting Fulmination procs or clip Flame Shock.

TL;DR: don't clip Flame Shock, it's not worth it.

Situation: You already have some Lightning Shield charges (LScharges), your Shock cooldown is free, and you have some time (not more than 6 seconds) Flame Shock dot remaining (dotrem). You have two choices: (1) cast Earth Shock, letting Flame Shock fall of for a small amount of time (0-6 seconds), but not wasting any Rolling Thunder procs, or (2) cast Flame Shock, losing some ticks of the old dot, maybe wasting some Rolling Thunder procs but keeping Flame Shock running.

I'm using my gear for reference here (4079 spell damage, 36,76% haste, 44,03% crit, 30% overload chance)
(1) cast Earth Shock, letting FS drop (if dotrem < 6 seconds), not wasting any Rolling Thunder charges
You gain:
Earth Shock: 3475 (2348 * (1 + 1.09) * crit))
Fulmination: 2211 * max(0,(LScharges - 3)) [max(0,(LScharges - 3)) * 1491 * (1 + 1.09 * crit)]

Flame Shock is still ticking for dotrem seconds:
Flame Shock dot for dotrem seconds: 547 * dotrem [0.46 * dotrem * 803 * (1 + 1.09 * crit)]

Number of ticks: dotrem / time_between_ticks = dotrem / (3 / (1 + haste)) = dotrem * (1 + haste) / 3 = 0.46 * dotrem

After that, we have 6 sec - gcd = 4.90sec left of the Shock cooldown in which we can cast other spells. You only have dotrem seconds left of your Flame Shock dot.
If you are somewhere in your rotation, there's a chance of (dotrem - lvb_cast) / 8 that Lava Burst will come off cooldown naturally and can be finished casting while Flame Shock is still ticking. There's also a 20% chance for every Flame Shock tick to reset the Lava Burst cooldown, but if the last tick resets Lava Burst, we can't finish casting before the Flame Shock dot falls off. So we get another 0.2 * (0.46 * dotrem - 1) = (9.2% * dotrem - 20%) chance that we can finish casting Lava Burst before the Flame Shock dot falls of.
So on average, we will cast 0.22 * dotrem - 0.34 Lava Bursts before the next Shock comes off cooldown.
You gain:
Lava Burst: 3508 * dotrem - 5422 [(0.22 * dotrem - 0.34) * 13017 * (1 + 0.75 * overload)]

These Lava Bursts took 0.22 * dotrem - 0.34 * 1.1 = 0.24 * dotrem - 0.37 seconds, so we are left with 4.9 - (0.24 * dotrem - 0.37) = 5.27 - 0.24 * dotrem seconds until the next Shock comes off cooldown. In this time we will cast on average 5.27 - (0.24 * dotrem) / 1.46 = 3.61 - 0.16 * dotrem Lightning Bolts and gain 2.166 - 0.1 * dotrem Lightning Shield charges.
You gain:
Lightning Bolt: 28247 - 1251 * dotrem [(3.61 - 0.16 * dotrem) * 4316 * (1 + 0.75 * overload) * (1 + 1.09 * crit)]
You have also gained an average of 2.166 - 0.1 * dotrem Lightning Shield charges, worth 4789 - 221 * dotrem [(2.166 - 0.1 * dotrem) * 1494 * (1 + 1.09 * crit)] of damage on the next Earth Shock

After all that, Shocks come off cooldown and we can cast Flame Shock.
You gain:
Flame Shock direct damage: 2221 [1501 * (1 + 1.09 * crit)]

Assuming you have 6 seconds left on your Flame Shock, you would finish with 4.57 Lightning Shield charges and deal
3475 + 2211 * max(0,(LScharges - 3)) + 547 * 6 + 3508 * 6 - 5422 + 28247 - 1251 * 6 + 4789 - 221 * 6 + 2221 = 48808 + 2211 * max(0,(LScharges - 3)) damage

LScharges to start	Damage
3	48808
4	51019
5	53230
6	55441
7	57652
8	59863
9	62074

(2) cast Flame Shock, clipping the dot:
You lose:
Flame Shock dot for dotrem seconds: 547 * dotrem (0.46 * dotrem * 803 * (1 + 1.09 * crit))

Number of ticks: dotrem / time_between_ticks = dotrem / (3 / (1 + haste)) = dotrem * (1 + haste) / 3 = 0.46 * dotrem

You gain:
Flame Shock direct damage: 2221 (1501 * (1 + 1.09 * crit))
Flame Shock dot for 6 seconds: 3256 (2.74 * 803 * (1 + 1.09 * crit))

Number of ticks: 6 / time_between_ticks = 6 / (3 / (1 + haste)) = 2 * (1 + haste) = 2.74

After that, we have 6 sec - gcd = 4.90sec left of the Shock cooldown in which we can cast other spells.
If you are somewhere in your rotation, there's a chance of 4.90 / 8 = 61.25% that Lava Burst will come off cooldown naturally before the next Shock is available. There's also a 20% chance for every Flame Shock tick to reset the Lava Burst cooldown, so we get another 0.2 * 2.74 = 54.80% chance that we can cast Lava Burst. So on average, we will cast 0.6125 + 0.5480 = 1.16 Lava Bursts before the next Shock comes off cooldown.
You gain:
Lava Burst: 18497 (1.16 * 13017 * (1 + 0.75 * overload))

These Lava Bursts took 1.27 sec (1.16 * gcd) to cast, so we are left with 3.63 (4.90 - 1.27) seconds until the next Shock comes off cooldown. In this time we will cast on average 2.48 (3.63 / 1.46) Lightning Bolts and gain 1.49 Lightning Shield charges.
You gain:
Lightning Bolt: 19405 (2.48 * 4316 * (1 + 0.75 * overload) * (1 + 1.09 * crit))

After all that, Shocks come off cooldown and we can cast Earth Shock if (LScharges + 1.49) >= 9 (we only cast ES with 9 charges for max dps, unless Flame Shock might fall off)
You gain:
Earth Shock if LS_charges + 1.49 >= 9: 3475 (2348 * (1 + 1.09 * crit))
Fulmination: 2211 * (LScharges - 3) + 3294 (max(0,(LScharges - 3 + 1.49)) * 1494 * (1 + 1.09 * crit)

Assuming you have 6 seconds left on your Flame Shock, you would deal
2221 + 3256 - 6 * 547 + 18497 + 19405 + (3475) + 2211 * max(0,(LScharges - 3)) + 3294 = 46866 + 2211 * max(0,(LScharges - 3)) damage

LScharges to start	LS charges when casting ES becomes available	Damage
3	4.49	46685
4	5.49	48896
5	6.49	51107
6	7.49	53318
7	8.49	55529
8	9	60132
9	9	60132

Putting both choices into one table:

LScharges to start	clipping Flame Shock	not clipping Flame Shock
3	46685	48808
4	48896	51019
5	51107	53230
6	53318	55441
7	55529	57652
8	60132	59863
9	60132	62074

As you can see, only if you start with 8 Lightning Shield charges, clipping Flame Shock becomes worth it. These values are of course based on my current gear and I'm not perfect, so there might be errors in my calculations.

Using the math above, you could create a graph that shows you the better choice, based on available LS charges and remaining FS dot time, but you wouldn't consult a 3D-graph while raiding, would you?

[edit] I hope I don't get another infraction for posting a wall of text in the Simple Questions/Simple Answers Thread, after receiving one for posting the same without math to back it

Totalsham · 10/25/10, 12:46 AM

Hello everyone

First I would like to say thank you. I been lurking in this forums for almost five years, gaining knowledge from almost every poster, new patches, multiple classes, numerous specs and finally I am making my first post ever. I am making this here since I cannot make new threads and figured this was the best place for this type of question.

The reason I am finally posting is maybe due to my issue being a super easy question/issues that it doesn't call for a post. Yet this issue has been in my head since the patch. I knocked it around for a bit and can't seem to solve the raging battle inside my brain for myself. Also either the search feature here is as bad as the search feature is on the rogan board since my search for the answers have yet to turn up in the result column.

The "thing" that is bugging me Is multi-layered and im not the best of story tellers. So here it is in a nut shell and hopefully I can convey this to you well enough to get some discussion or answers.

Focused Insight.... Now we all know what this does. A shock drops the next heals mana cost and boosts that direct heal by a % depending on how many talent points you put in. I have 2 points in the talent so it is as follows:

"Focused Insight Rank 2
After casting any Shock spell, your next heal's mana cost is reduced by 50% of the cost of the Shock spell, and its healing effectiveness is increased by 20%."

Now is it viable as a resto shammy to be casting shocks before heals? I know the global cool down will slow down your ability to faceroll on your chain heal button but from what im seeing since the patch, i am liking my shammy more as a tank/single target healer (till healing rains comes). Also the buff received from the shock and focused insight only works on direct heals, so im 99% sure it doesn't kick in when using chain heals. I feel it isnt viable to be a clicker and targeting a boss or whom ever the tank is beating on and shock it and then click back on a raid member to heal them. That would waste more valuable time you could have been healing and would diminish the returns on any savings of mana .. this turns me to my next question.

Now I use a standard mouse for the last 5 years. I just ordered a mouse that has 17 MMO-optimized buttons (Razer Naga MMOG Laser Gaming Mouse)... MACROS!!! I never ever used macros before. No clue how to make them, use them, set them up or even where to go to learn about em. Chinese or greek might be easier to learn em for all I know,. Now I didnt do the theory crafting but I'm wondering would it make any sense to somehow incorporate the shock ability into a macro that makes the shock fire off before you cast a direct heal? Is it possible or viable to make a macro that targets whom ever a named tank is target, fires off a shock, then targets that tank and heals him with say a greater healing wave all in one button?

In doing some math say you used flame shock. its mana cost is 747. Followed that by greater heal, which cost you 1238. The 50% reduction from 2 points in focused insight gives you 373.5 off of your greater healing wave cost making it 864.5

Essentially you are paying the same price of just casting a Greater healing wave spell, but getting a free shock and a 20% bonus to healing.

Is this worth macro'ing? or does having 3 points in focused insight where the payoff comes from doing this?