I disagree with that, Shadow Bolt is still a very large % of our DPS. More then any other spell besides Drain Soul on most fights, missing it sucks. If you run a 53/0/18 build dropping 2 out of ISB for MC is better then dropping 2 out of Cataclysm.

Just wondering what you mean by HAT? I was thinking Honor Among Thieves as you're talking about rogues but I couldn't see how that would provide a significat dps increase.

Just had a look at that WWS you posted actually and I must be missing something, the top two rogues on that Patchwerk kill didn't have any combo point moves listed.

Sorry for derailing the subject.

Basically with 2 HAT rogues in a group with other classes that crit a lot will provide the rogues with constant 5 combo pts. So they can literally spam eviscerate/rupture/snd w/o ever having to use a combo point generating skill such as sinister strike.

ie. how i lost to 2 rogues last night
Wow Web Stats

HAT is broken, and GC commented that the combo point part of the bug is not working correctly. We stack their group usually with Hunters, since their pets crits also count...

I arrived at the same conclusion you did in the course of SimCrafting the variations in the builds, but don't forget that Immolate is a Destruction spell, so it has the same likelyhood of missing as a Shadow Bolt. In spite of this, it is likely that Molten Core is worth more than Cataclysm. In my simulations one point in Molten Core gives over 50% Molten Core uptime in a Haunt/Ruin build. Two points was optimal but I'm still experimenting with some variations.

I did include Immolate in my calculations, but missing SB has more of an effect than missing Immolate since you're losing 1.5s of filler (or SB) time, vs. an entire SB. I definitely saw a very high MC uptime with 2/3 MC.

Here's the way I look at it:

Immolate makes up 10-11% of my damage. Even assuming 100% uptime, Molten Core represents a 1-1.1% overall DPS increase.

Dropping 3% hit via Cataclysm means that 1/33 Destruction casts will miss. That includes Shadow Bolt and Immolate. Shadow Bolt typically counts for 35% of my total damage done, so we can knock off about the same 1%+ DPS. Immolate is a bit tricker. It's likely that if it misses, you won't immediately recast it because you'll already be queuing something else. You'll likely lose just a tick or two per miss.

The problem is that as soon as you drop below the hitcap, you're rolling the dice. Yeah, you might not miss at all over the course of a fight, but you might miss 5% of the time, or possibly more. It's not a good move to purposefully be under the hitcap and throw caution to the wind.

Regardless, I think 13% (or 14% for you unlucky Horde) should be the starndard. Relying on +hit talents, particularly the ones for Destruction only pulls points from other talents that would stand to make a larger DPS gain.

Nothing special, Keep everything up, spam SB, don't cut off any casts, don't wait to cast anything, and mix in DS with an SCT Event for when it ticks. Simcraft parses for my gear and spec typically back my numbers up pretty accurately.

There's simply no reason to not hitcap yourself. The crowded length of DoT durations and the Haunt cooldown make things tricky enough without the money wrench of a failed cast thrown in there too. Let's say you cast UA and Immo back to back, and an Immolate misses. You immediately recast. Now you've got 1.5sec of dead space sitting between your UA and Immo. So you end up either clipping Immo to cast it earlier (which might not even work according to the Bug Thread), or you let UA fall off and wait for Immo to come back around again. And if it happens sub-25% when you're trying to mix DS in as well, it will only complicate things further. Consider too fights like Sarth+Drakes where precise movement is essential or squeezing in one more cast in that spark patch before the Malygos Vortex. Patchwerk is fun to measure on, but it's more a test-track for the real-world roads that are the other encounters.

I use SB>Haunt>UA>Immo>Corr>CoA>SL, last Patch SB was 30% of my DPS on a 3 min fight where I did ~5600 DPS.

I assume the +/- 5% has a lot to do with RNG on Nightfall/Glyph Procs as well as fight length.

Short fights tend to favor SB since the long ramp up time of DoTs gets neutralized by their high DPCT over time.

And honestly, I'm ok with a little more complexity if it means increasing my DPS. That doesn't mean I'm not choosing hit gear so I can drop 3 points from Suppression, but only that while I'm stacking hit to hitcap my DoTs, I'm not going to talent into Cataclysm when those points would be spent better elsewhere.

ehm, more on Cataclysm vs Molten Core - I will never go bellow hit cap and I will never miss a Shadow Bolt, the problem is that increasing hit rating by gear I loose some spell power, to be more precise 1 point in Molten Core costs me 30,875 spell power, that is about 35dps, on my last patchwerk fight my Immolate done about 358dps (86000 dmg over 4min), if I would have 75% Molten Core up time (I guess that would be putting 3points there), that would be (86000 + 86000 * 0,1 * 0,75) = 92450 dmg over 4min = 385dps, thats 27dps more compared to 3*35 = 105 if I would have 3/3 Cataclysm over Molten Core. Even if Molten Core would stay there 100% of time, that would be 395dps, so the conclusion would be that 1/3 Cataclysm is worth more than 3/3 Molten Core for an affliction warlock or am I wrong?

P.S. lets do some more maths: to Molten Core become more viable than Cataclysm we need it to increase dps by 105, so that would need Immo to do over 1050dps, that would be 63000 per minute or 15750 per cast? That is 3 times greater than mentioned in the first post.

Update: I'm considering taking Improved Imp or Demonic Power (or maybe both) over Cataclysm etc., because my Imp does about 350dps and Improved Imp would boost that by 30% ant that is exactly 105 but it will increase with gear (I'm still wearing t5 shoulders ) and With Demonic Power per 10sec instead of 4 firebolts he would shoot 5 of them, average hit 875, so 875*4/10 = 350 vs 875*5/10= 437,5, that is 87,5 dps for two talent points vs 70 if putting two points in Cataclysm, However in some fights like Saphiron imp wont be able to dps and that will be the loss of almost 300 dps, mhm, I think I can live with that, int he worst case I still have my t5 2set bonus