Meatskull: So it's very obvious why your dps is higher than his on that wws:
1) Your gear is distinctly better than his. He would gain anywhere from 100-200 dps by getting a few of the pieces that you have, like the Dragonsoul just to name an obvious one.
2) WWS isn't showing his pet. I'm assuming this is because he was using a Doomguard so if we take your pet away you're suddenly looking at 5117 DPS (compared to his 5096 without pet).
3) He's not that good at playing an Affliction Lock: his dot uptimes are as follows:
- Corruption: 95% (there is no excuse for less than 100%)
- UA: 85%
- Immo: 76% (this should never be different from UA. The fact that he has a different uptime for Immo makes me suspicious of what he's doing)
- CoA: 90%
- SL: 85%
BUT HERE IS THE KICKER: Haunt: 9 hits, at BEST 12 second full duration each assuming he didn't clip them at all = 61% uptime.
Ya, so the spell that increases DoT damage by 20% is only up 61% of the time, and he's only 100 dps behind you?
Affliction > your spec, stop trying to convince people otherwise.
Two mistakes here: Immolation uptime will always be lower than UA, because you drop immo once you start using drain soul. And his Haunt uptime is actually 92% - you forgot to count the Haunt crits. 92% may not be perfect, but it's not necessarily bad - it's quite common to have haunt drop off for a bit while waiting for a drain soul tick.
If well played, especially on a spank-fight like Patchwerk, considering roughly equal gear, Affliction SHOULD out-dps any destro build.
Indeed the numbers certainly point to that fact, and i think they might be right for the most part. However, some people seem to do better in one spec rather than another regardless of gear. I often grab the top spot on Patchy as 41/30 over a couple of affy locks in guild. (I was very slightly better geared than them though)
Personally I find that FG/EM is better for me overall when I look at a nights raiding over 2 or 3 wings of Naxx. Not to mention more relaxing..
Perhaps Affliction can push out better numbers on Patchy. Thats does not make it ">" than anyones spec.
Fully agree. Anything that involves fast target switches and burst dps, destruction completely destroys affliction. On single target fights affliction wins, but clearly not by a huge margin. So one can easily argue that destruction might actually be the better spec if you look at the reality of the game rather than one isolated, highly uncommon scenario. But personally speaking I would never even say "Spec A > Spec B" because whether that's true really depends on ones personal preference and playstyle.
Fully agree. Anything that involves fast target switches and burst dps, destruction completely destroys affliction. On single target fights affliction wins, but clearly not by a huge margin. So one can easily argue that destruction might actually be the better spec if you look at the reality of the game rather than one isolated, highly uncommon scenario. But personally speaking I would never even say "Spec A > Spec B" because whether that's true really depends on ones personal preference and playstyle.
Excellent summary of the last page or so. The reason I even attempted to raise such points was because I raid with 3 warlocks, and we change specs whenever we have good reason to test various aspects. We generally have the greatest dps related success as 1 of 2 specs. A variant of 56/0/15(affliction) and 2/13/56(destruction).
If this is going to turn into an A or B comparison and/or discussion, then here are some points to agree or disagree with:
Affliction:
1-highest boss dps potential
2-least talent emphasis on pet usage, most freedom in pet choice
3-high output potential when movement is required
4-threat issues (65+% of TPS can continue while not casting)
5-AOE via Seed of Corruption does high damage which can lead to threat issues quickly, and damage cannot be stopped in some cases
Destruction:
1-emergency burst damage easily supplied (coupled with dps that matches similar geared people)*1
2-max improved healthstone without dps related trade-offs (0/13/51+7)
3-typically includes 10% threat reduction
4-output can be started and stopped close to a dime (excluding negligible TPS from dots)
5-AOE generally provided by Rain of Fire, damage can be started and stopped very quickly
6-Imp should be used, limitations can arise, but Blood Pact is supplied without cost
*1 dps can be + or - similar geared people depending on environment, i would deem +/- 500 dps acceptable deviation
Bonus:
Other points exist on proc and crit related output (for both specs (for good and for bad)), but I cannot word them how I would like.
---
Sorry, once again I want to emphasize that affliction is continually seen as the highest dps spec after the patch.
If 2 warlocks of different cookie cutter specs, with the exact same gear, are present in the same fight-- it is unlikely that non affliction spec will do more damage. Unless they have bad luck and you have good luck. I am basing this generalization on the fact that I raid with multiple warlocks, so I can see first hand what a different spec does for a person when compared to a different spec warlock in the same raid (same buffs aswell). I can provide a quantity of wws/wmo parses which show this trend.
This statement should hold true for any level of gear currently available. I have not seen any evidence to indicate otherwise.
Hybrid demo/destro combination specs are viable to say the least, but many have concluded that they are not a "highest dps spec".
Last edited by meatskull : 01/30/09 at 7:33 PM.
Reason: adding to end of post (again)
We seem to be discounting the generally consitent performance of the Demo/Destro hybrid, (41/30 FG/EM for example) specs here. The Hybrid specs seem to be performing well across most boss fights, often in my experience landing them greater boss damage over the duration of a raid.
Your point about affliction prividing good damage in movement heavy fights seems to be a bone of contention. Some people disagree as it is difficult to maintain the more complex rotation, wheras others state that the strength of thier instant cast dots on the move puts them ahead. This I guess boils down to to the individual players style and skill, and cant really be quantified.
This I guess boils down to to the individual players style and skill, and cant really be quantified.
I disagree, just become some people aren't skilled enough to maintain proper spell uptimes doesn't make a spec worse. Affliction is by far the most challenging spec currently (as much as anything can be atm) and there are a large number of people who cannot pull it off.
To quote a thread I read a long time ago: people seem to be missing the name of the website they are coming to. This is for discussing things at the ultra high-end of WoW. If you're doing less than 5k dps you don't really belong as a part of these discussions anyways. If Affliction is better "if you can pull it off" then guess what, it's better. This is Elitist Jerks, this is for players who can play their class properly. We don't need to talk about people who can't manage a simple priority system because this isn't a discussion of "what's the highest dps depending on how good you are." This is a discussion of "highest DPS" period.
Affliction has the most potential DPS on most current fights, nobody in their right mind would dispute that. On practice though, this somewhat relies on having a doomguard up, in current farm content, it is easy to have a DG up for the specific encounters that are considered DPS benchmarks, and it does help increase afflction's overall DPS on those encounters. Outside those encounters though, affliction's dps tends to be a lot closer to other popular raiding spec's DPS (with standard exceptions, such as loatheb, thaddius, etc.).
My point is, that people tend to lose track of the fact that on a progression raid, and attempts on new encounters, you can only have one DG per attempt every hour. Yes, the potential to do more DPS is there, but realistically speaking, that potential can only be reached one attempt every hour. It's nice that affliction can pull out ahead from other specs, but to say that affliction numbers on PW will accurately reflect the DPS that affliction will do on every progression raid (such as the upcoming Ulduar) is not very realistic. Remember those numbers reflect one attempt done every hour. Still it is worth to mention once more that the potential is there (and it does help), but it's not something that you can achieve on every attempt.
I guess what I'm trying to say, being able to use a DG as affliction spec should be considered a bonus (a big bonus at that), but it shouldn't be considered the norm in progression raids considering the one hour cooldown.
I disagree, just become some people aren't skilled enough to maintain proper spell uptimes doesn't make a spec worse. Affliction is by far the most challenging spec currently (as much as anything can be atm) and there are a large number of people who cannot pull it off.
To quote a thread I read a long time ago: people seem to be missing the name of the website they are coming to. This is for discussing things at the ultra high-end of WoW. If you're doing less than 5k dps you don't really belong as a part of these discussions anyways. If Affliction is better "if you can pull it off" then guess what, it's better. This is Elitist Jerks, this is for players who can play their class properly. We don't need to talk about people who can't manage a simple priority system because this isn't a discussion of "what's the highest dps depending on how good you are." This is a discussion of "highest DPS" period.
Just because a CD happened to be ready or a timer on a dot ran out at the same time as an area of effect forced you to move does not mean that the player is bad. You can lose significant uptime if you are forced to move as your Haunt or SE effects are timing out, also potentially losing Corruption forcing you to essentially restart the entire priority list to reapply those buffs. Not only is this resulting in lost DPS, but it frustrates the hell out of me. Does Affliction have the highest output potential? Absolutely, but it is also, IMO, the most adversely effected by environmental concerns. In terms of consistancy, which I believe is what most people are currently discussing, it is probably the worst spec available to us. Its potential output is so widely ranging based upon the scenarios of a fight that it could very well do the worst damage in certain fights, purely based on bad luck with the RNG. I believe quite a few people have cited that over the course of an entire clear, Affliction is very likely to not have the highest total boss damage, largely do to these effects. I know this is what I have personally witnessed and any spec that is at the mercy of the RNG this much is just too frustrating for me. On a progression/learning fight or even when the raid is insufficiently geared enough that the fights last "longer" than they should, affliction will have a larger chance to suffer than the other specs from these uncontrollable influences. After you overgear a fight and you can finish it in 2 min or less, or after you are so confortable with a fight that you can consistantly predict when you need to move and preemptively respond by clipping, then sure affliction is best, but then who cares, you already overgear the fight and have little chance of failure.
Bottom line is there is a difference between those who truly cant manage or understand a spell priority system and those who simply dont like the loss of DPS to a completely random environmental effect that is not in anyway controllable. Or maybe you are elite and everyone else isnt.
You can lose significant uptime if you are forced to move as your Haunt or SE effects are timing out, also potentially losing Corruption forcing you to essentially restart the entire priority list to reapply those buffs. Not only is this resulting in lost DPS, but it frustrates the hell out of me.
Bottom line is there is a difference between those who truly cant manage or understand a spell priority system and those who simply dont like the loss of DPS to a completely random environmental effect that is not in anyway controllable. Or maybe you are elite and everyone else isnt.
On those movement fights: a few seconds lost in uptime doesn't decrease DPS by that much. Haunt has a big enough window that if you know movement may be incoming, you can clip it a bit and not worry about Corr/SE dropping. Most movement is only 1 gcd which can be used to CoA/SL/LT. A large amount of movement you can even slip haunt/UA/Immos in. If you have all of that up already, losing DPS time on SBs is the lowest impact you could have and actually means you're better off than other classes which don't have as high variation in their DPCT.
On learning fights: after a week or two of running 3.0 affliction, if you're still flustered by the rotation, then yes you might want to go to an easier spec. With a tailored UI, it shouldn't require enough of your attention to distract you from that 40 foot wall of fire coming at you.
I disagree, just become some people aren't skilled enough to maintain proper spell uptimes doesn't make a spec worse. Affliction is by far the most challenging spec currently (as much as anything can be atm) and there are a large number of people who cannot pull it off.
To quote a thread I read a long time ago: people seem to be missing the name of the website they are coming to. This is for discussing things at the ultra high-end of WoW. If you're doing less than 5k dps you don't really belong as a part of these discussions anyways. If Affliction is better "if you can pull it off" then guess what, it's better. This is Elitist Jerks, this is for players who can play their class properly. We don't need to talk about people who can't manage a simple priority system because this isn't a discussion of "what's the highest dps depending on how good you are." This is a discussion of "highest DPS" period.
I think perhaps I worded that incorrectly or you misunderstood my meaning. I agree that a players skill does not affect how good a spec is. But it does affect how good a spec is for a player.
I also feel that saying because someone can only raid say, 6 hours a week maybe, like myself, that they are not "hardcore" or "elite", does not mean that they have no place in these discusions. People come here to learn, look for and provide answers to anybody who wants to be as good as they can be at thier class. Beyond basic skill, 5K DPS is gear dependant. Gear comes with time. We all have varying amounts of it to play and thus varying levels of gear and DPS output. Having more time does not make someone "elite".
Bottom line is there is a difference between those who truly cant manage or understand a spell priority system and those who simply dont like the loss of DPS to a completely random environmental effect that is not in anyway controllable. Or maybe you are elite and everyone else isnt.
Please tell me of an encounter where a random element prevents you from looking at your DoT timers and possibly reapplying Haunt early in order to ensure that SE, Corruption, and Haunt stay up at all times. I would enjoy being educated on how I've managed to defeat every boss in the game and yet somehow not have my Haunt wear off because of intelligent planning.
To Xera81:
No, being casual does not make you less viable to post here, but I will once again point to the title of this thread: "Highest DPS specs after patch" not "how high are specs after the patch". Affliction can post numbers of 6.5k and higher with a Doomguard. Is anyone else pulling off numbers that high? "Well depends on fight and gear and skill and whatnot..." is not relevant here. Highest DPS spec is the question posed by the thread and so the only thing that matters is the highest gear at the highest skill with the highest dps setting possible (Patchwerk).
Yes but again its not the "spec" getting you to 6.5k its the Doomguard, like a person said previous, it cannot be claimed as top damage if you cant do it on every boss numerous times, If you somehow wiped on Patchwerk, what would your dps be on the next attmpt? or would you wait 1hr to try again?
Now im not saying you should be doing 6.5k on every boss, but you arent going to have the Doomguard for every fight. So it cant be counted as part of the spec. You can only claim top dps "spec" if you use only your spec and non special demons, Infernal could be included as its cd is viable for 1 in 3 attempts, not 1 in 25.
Ladies and Gentleman, I'd like to introduce you to....... the asterisk (*)
It goes something like this:
The highest DPS spec after the patch is affliction with a summoned Doomguard*
*insert reason why people think Doomguard is a gimmick here...
All joking aside, I can see both sides of the argument. I think for comparative purposes though, the Doomguard should not be included in the equation. I've had several occasions the past week and a half where we wiped because of something stupid on the first attempt (on random bosses). Guess what? No more Doomguard for an hour.
Let's all acknowledge that the Doomguard is awesome, move on, and figure out what the best spec is without a Doomguard.
Yes but again its not the "spec" getting you to 6.5k its the Doomguard, like a person said previous, it cannot be claimed as top damage if you cant do it on every boss numerous times, If you somehow wiped on Patchwerk, what would your dps be on the next attmpt? or would you wait 1hr to try again?
Now im not saying you should be doing 6.5k on every boss, but you arent going to have the Doomguard for every fight. So it cant be counted as part of the spec. You can only claim top dps "spec" if you use only your spec and non special demons, Infernal could be included as its cd is viable for 1 in 3 attempts, not 1 in 25.
This is starting to sound like rules for dueling. Can't use stealth, can't use cooldowns, can't use pots, can't use bandages. Are you joking? Who wipes on Patchwerk honestly. I'd agree with you if this was a case like Arcane Mages where in 3.0.3 they could do highest DPS for about 20 seconds and then be out of mana and out of options. We're using it for 2-3 bosses that are important, then missing out on a couple bosses, then coming back again with it. Total damage in fact is far higher across all bosses with it, despite your "limited uses" argument.
The argument is that on progression content (which is arguably the most important time to consider just how much dps you can pump out) we won't be seeing much use out of the Doomguard. Yes it's nice to have on stuff you're farming or just behind the eight ball on but when you're working on a boss you're learning it's a different ball game and the Doomguard won't be up often enough to use every attempt.
I'm not saying it isn't handy to bust out when you think you've just about got the encounter down. But it's not constant dps that you can count on having every attempt.
The argument is that on progression content (which is arguably the most important time to consider just how much dps you can pump out) we won't be seeing much use out of the Doomguard. Yes it's nice to have on stuff you're farming or just behind the eight ball on but when you're working on a boss you're learning it's a different ball game and the Doomguard won't be up often enough to use every attempt.
I'm not saying it isn't handy to bust out when you think you've just about got the encounter down. But it's not constant dps that you can count on having every attempt.
This argument is why I'm against patch WWS being the only step in evaluating specs. We can all agree its a good way to eliminate variables in any given spec but to not then evaluate how and to what degree different variables will affect the numbers is foolish. Meatskull did a good job of outlining the different specs pros and cons in #254.
I'm really liking WoW Meter Online's graph of DPS in a fight as it is a great tool for figuring when/how long DPS peaks and plateaus occur for given specs.
This argument is why I'm against patch WWS being the only step in evaluating specs. We can all agree its a good way to eliminate variables in any given spec but to not then evaluate how and to what degree different variables will affect the numbers is foolish. Meatskull did a good job of outlining the different specs pros and cons in #254.
I'm really liking WoW Meter Online's graph of DPS in a fight as it is a great tool for figuring when/how long DPS peaks and plateaus occur for given specs.
I agree with the argument, Cob, but it's not at all relevant to what you quoted.
The quoted argument is simply that for any non-farm boss you can only use the Doomguard for one attempt per hour, because it goes away when you die.
People are getting sidetracked because a farm boss is being used as a benchmark, and forget that we're not actually interested in that specific fight - we're just using it to benchmark performance.
How we measure the DPS is irrelevant (assuming an acceptable level of accuracy). It's the resulting benchmark that we are interested in. Including an ability that will only be available for one attempt per hour is not a credible benchmark, unless you only want to make one attempt per hour.
Last edited by Lurker37 : 02/01/09 at 7:11 PM.
Reason: caveat - DPS measurement must be accurate
On one hand, if you can only fight a particular boss once a week, why not use a 1-hr cool down on it for max dps?
On the other hand, it is valid to say that a spell that is independent from all specs and cannot be used on 100% of the boss encounters should not be considered in the discussion of 'Highest DPS specs after patch'.
Using the data from Brainchild's attempt posted above, his Doomguard accounted for 20% of his dps or about 1276dps. If you subtract this, you end up with about 5100dps for the player without the pet. The 20% seems to be a fair constant on this fight for most WWS reports posted in this thread.
At this point, it might be worthwhile to start extrapolating the pet dmg from the player so we can see how much of a difference it makes. Of course this is complicated by the fact that any talents affecting pet performance will skew the data. Since the prime 55/0/16 build doesn't use any pet talents, this might be the best spec to model individual pet performance. The problem is that I doubt we will find enough warlocks in the community that will sacrifice their dps on Patchwerk to simply do a live test of untalented pet damage.
It seems obvious that the 0/41/30 player will only use Felguard and the 2/13/56 and other variants will only use the Imp. Maybe Affliction is the only spec that truly has choice of pet usage and this is why it has risen to the top as the 'highest dps spec'. If pets are taken out of the equation, a lot of WWS reports would disagree it is the hands-down top performer.
That is A very short fight, an affliction lock can pull that Dps on a fight much longer than that (300+ seconds) Thats simply Heroism+meta for 50% of the fight
edit
Im guessing an affliction lock with a doomgaurd might not be that high but then again it definitely might be higher.
The character linked in your profile appears to be below level 10. This may account for your poor Patchwerk DPS.
That is A very short fight, an affliction lock can pull that Dps on a fight much longer than that (300+ seconds) Thats simply Heroism+meta for 50% of the fight
edit
Im guessing an affliction lock with a doomgaurd might not be that high but then again it definitely might be higher.
Take a look at other fights in this wws.
And why you compare DPS only at patchwerk? Coz it's best encounter for affli-locks? And if other encounter - than your answer "is wrong encounter"? LOL
I realy like affliction tree, but be objective - at this moment affli isn't a panacea, and isn't only choice.
01/29/09, 10:00 AM
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