02-23-2007, 10:04 PM
(This post was last modified: 02-23-2007, 11:49 PM by Concillian.)
Some of you may remember I did some warrior hybrid spec comparisons earlier and I'm back to share my recent findings in comparing specs with some level 70 blue gear.
I have compared the following specs, hereafter referred to as Fury, Arms, and Fury / Prot:
Fury: http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=pVMcdZVVzVTgoVuVoc
Fury / Prot: http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=pZVV0VLxoVzZfVtoI0zox
Arms: http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=pVMcdAioM0dioE0zVZc
My modeling methods aassume the following:
Arms rage is used for MS when possible. Additional rage calculated as giving 0.75 damage per rage compared to MS
Fury rage is used for Bloodthirst. Additional rage is funneled into keeping Rampage up. No additional rage goes into the model, so there is potential for upside here.
Fury / Prot rage goes into Bloodthirst. Additional rage is not factored, again upside is available. I'm considering moving some points here out of DW spec and into imp. slam because it is probably the next best damage per rage, but the modeling gest screwy with the resetting of the swing timer, especially when looking at WF totem too.
Modeling suggested that the extra damage from 1H spec is quite clearly better than additional +hit, hence the choice of 5/5 in 1H spec and 0/3 in precision for the Fury / Prot build
Gear assumptions:
DW: http://ctprofiles.net/5056406
2H: http://ctprofiles.net/5139784
These are all blue armor and grindable / craftable purples (mostly BS weaponsmith purples).
DPS estimates:
I'm estimateing DPS by adding MS / BT damage to white damage with no additional damage sources. Blood Frenzy is assumed to be on the target in the arms build. Rampage is assumed to be on so that the average AP gain is +150. The windfury damage assumes spamming a proc-able attack every ~1.7 seconds (global cooldown + some lag) and does NOT take into account the extra rage or damage aside from the white damage from windfury... the assumption is that rage gained is used in spamstringing to proc WF.
This also assumes being in Berserker all the time, something that probably wouldn't be the case, but that gets too complex to model when going back and forth to battle to keep up T-clap.
Damage listed in the format: DPS / DPS with WF
20% armor
F = 572 / 697
F/P=521 / 640
A = 497 / 650
30% armor
F = 500 / 609
F/P=456 / 560
A = 421 / 555
40% armor
F = 429 / 522
F/P=391 / 481
A = 323 / 438
A little surprising to me how close they were, but both the Fury builds should have a little more seperation from Arms due to not taking into account ALL the rage in my analysis.
Observations and Trends:
DW does more white damage and is less affected by armor. However, the damage gained from rage is less than 2H and the gain from Windfury totem is also less.
Assuming a WF totem is around, these builds are surprisingly close.
Without WF The Fury build pulls ahead, around 10-15% at this gearing level, but again, things get a lot closer if WF totem is around.
"Flavor" of the builds:
Fury / Prot is best of the 3 for threat in tanking. Having shield block means it's probably also most mitigation, even without the +5% parry from the arms tree. It essentially trades tanking points for imp. t-clap, so a little less raid friendly in a pure DPS role, where imp. t-clap really shines. Has a couple decent PvP skills... last stand, concussion blow and 1/2 shield bash, but misses out on improved intercept.
Fury offers the best individual damage, but has a lot of "ifs". If you drop berserker stance, the damage drops quite significantly... essentially equal to or below the Fury / Prot damage. It offers a little less in terms of PvP than the Fury/prot, with imp. intercept the only significant offering. Tanking is in the middle offering decent mitigation, and some better threat than arms, but not really anything special. Raid utility comes from imp. t-clap, which is somewhat at odds with the desire to stay in berserker for the full Fury benefit
Arms offers the most in terms of raid utility in t-clap + Blood Frenzy, but is a little lacking without WF totem. A huge plus is that there is very little lost if DPS is done in Battle Stance for keeping up t-clap... I'm pretty sure damage losses will be made up by opportunities to use Overpower on dodges. PvP has the second wind niceness (incredibly nice actually, given how much we are CC'ed) and the enormous group PvP buff of MS. Last stand might be better for PvP and tanking, but trades imp. battle shout, which I consider a raid staple of a DPS warrior.
Assuming you have 2-4 others in your group dealing physical damage, blood frenzy brings the total damage contribution from a full arms build right back on the level of Fury, and surpassing it in the event of a WF totem.
Surprisingly, gearing doesn't look too difficult for either of these. normal drops, some are quest rewards, and some are craftables. very little heroic mode loot was used for this comparison so that comparisons would be of relatively attainable gear.
The original purpose of this comparison is that I'm currently armorsmith and am definitely switching to weaponsmith. If I do so, a 2H build significantly favors the axe route and DW seems to signifiacntly favor the hammer route (under the assumption that you are under the effect of the proc 3% of the total time, which is likely a conservative estimate) I only want to make the switch once, and when I make the items there is no going back. I'm trying to decide on my spec moving forward right now. Any comments on this front are helpful. It's looking like I won't be needed for a ton of tanking (outside of 5-mans) which is why I'm entertaining full DPS builds.
At this point I'm a little torn, but Arms still seems like the way to go. It should be easier to control aggro by being lower damage, the damage comes up towards the other specs if there is a WF totem around, and Blood Frenzy allows distributing some of your DPS to those who can better deal with extra aggro (hunters and rogues) Any comments?
I have compared the following specs, hereafter referred to as Fury, Arms, and Fury / Prot:
Fury: http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=pVMcdZVVzVTgoVuVoc
Fury / Prot: http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=pZVV0VLxoVzZfVtoI0zox
Arms: http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=pVMcdAioM0dioE0zVZc
My modeling methods aassume the following:
Arms rage is used for MS when possible. Additional rage calculated as giving 0.75 damage per rage compared to MS
Fury rage is used for Bloodthirst. Additional rage is funneled into keeping Rampage up. No additional rage goes into the model, so there is potential for upside here.
Fury / Prot rage goes into Bloodthirst. Additional rage is not factored, again upside is available. I'm considering moving some points here out of DW spec and into imp. slam because it is probably the next best damage per rage, but the modeling gest screwy with the resetting of the swing timer, especially when looking at WF totem too.
Modeling suggested that the extra damage from 1H spec is quite clearly better than additional +hit, hence the choice of 5/5 in 1H spec and 0/3 in precision for the Fury / Prot build
Gear assumptions:
DW: http://ctprofiles.net/5056406
2H: http://ctprofiles.net/5139784
These are all blue armor and grindable / craftable purples (mostly BS weaponsmith purples).
DPS estimates:
I'm estimateing DPS by adding MS / BT damage to white damage with no additional damage sources. Blood Frenzy is assumed to be on the target in the arms build. Rampage is assumed to be on so that the average AP gain is +150. The windfury damage assumes spamming a proc-able attack every ~1.7 seconds (global cooldown + some lag) and does NOT take into account the extra rage or damage aside from the white damage from windfury... the assumption is that rage gained is used in spamstringing to proc WF.
This also assumes being in Berserker all the time, something that probably wouldn't be the case, but that gets too complex to model when going back and forth to battle to keep up T-clap.
Damage listed in the format: DPS / DPS with WF
20% armor
F = 572 / 697
F/P=521 / 640
A = 497 / 650
30% armor
F = 500 / 609
F/P=456 / 560
A = 421 / 555
40% armor
F = 429 / 522
F/P=391 / 481
A = 323 / 438
A little surprising to me how close they were, but both the Fury builds should have a little more seperation from Arms due to not taking into account ALL the rage in my analysis.
Observations and Trends:
DW does more white damage and is less affected by armor. However, the damage gained from rage is less than 2H and the gain from Windfury totem is also less.
Assuming a WF totem is around, these builds are surprisingly close.
Without WF The Fury build pulls ahead, around 10-15% at this gearing level, but again, things get a lot closer if WF totem is around.
"Flavor" of the builds:
Fury / Prot is best of the 3 for threat in tanking. Having shield block means it's probably also most mitigation, even without the +5% parry from the arms tree. It essentially trades tanking points for imp. t-clap, so a little less raid friendly in a pure DPS role, where imp. t-clap really shines. Has a couple decent PvP skills... last stand, concussion blow and 1/2 shield bash, but misses out on improved intercept.
Fury offers the best individual damage, but has a lot of "ifs". If you drop berserker stance, the damage drops quite significantly... essentially equal to or below the Fury / Prot damage. It offers a little less in terms of PvP than the Fury/prot, with imp. intercept the only significant offering. Tanking is in the middle offering decent mitigation, and some better threat than arms, but not really anything special. Raid utility comes from imp. t-clap, which is somewhat at odds with the desire to stay in berserker for the full Fury benefit
Arms offers the most in terms of raid utility in t-clap + Blood Frenzy, but is a little lacking without WF totem. A huge plus is that there is very little lost if DPS is done in Battle Stance for keeping up t-clap... I'm pretty sure damage losses will be made up by opportunities to use Overpower on dodges. PvP has the second wind niceness (incredibly nice actually, given how much we are CC'ed) and the enormous group PvP buff of MS. Last stand might be better for PvP and tanking, but trades imp. battle shout, which I consider a raid staple of a DPS warrior.
Assuming you have 2-4 others in your group dealing physical damage, blood frenzy brings the total damage contribution from a full arms build right back on the level of Fury, and surpassing it in the event of a WF totem.
Surprisingly, gearing doesn't look too difficult for either of these. normal drops, some are quest rewards, and some are craftables. very little heroic mode loot was used for this comparison so that comparisons would be of relatively attainable gear.
The original purpose of this comparison is that I'm currently armorsmith and am definitely switching to weaponsmith. If I do so, a 2H build significantly favors the axe route and DW seems to signifiacntly favor the hammer route (under the assumption that you are under the effect of the proc 3% of the total time, which is likely a conservative estimate) I only want to make the switch once, and when I make the items there is no going back. I'm trying to decide on my spec moving forward right now. Any comments on this front are helpful. It's looking like I won't be needed for a ton of tanking (outside of 5-mans) which is why I'm entertaining full DPS builds.
At this point I'm a little torn, but Arms still seems like the way to go. It should be easier to control aggro by being lower damage, the damage comes up towards the other specs if there is a WF totem around, and Blood Frenzy allows distributing some of your DPS to those who can better deal with extra aggro (hunters and rogues) Any comments?
Conc / Concillian -- Vintage player of many games. Deadly leader of the All Pally Team (or was it Death leader?)
Terenas WoW player... while we waited for Diablo III.
And it came... and it went... and I played Hearthstone longer than Diablo III.
Terenas WoW player... while we waited for Diablo III.
And it came... and it went... and I played Hearthstone longer than Diablo III.