High ilevel vs low tier items

[DiGG]

Was in an LFR yesterday, where I was beaten by a shadow priest (so am I), hands down on each boss fights. I put pretty much as much effort in lfr as in regular ToT, and so when I inspected the dude, I saw he was wearing 2 tier 14 items + 2 tier 15 items (1 lfr/1 regular), while I was wearing NONE, not one tier item (I do have tier 14 items, just not wearing them, but don't have any tier 15, zero luck there!). I checked him on armory, his ilevel was 512, while I was ilvl 517. He had a good 15-30K more dps than I, finishing fights upto 4% more damage than I.

So now I'm wondering, should I lower my own ilevel now, to get 2 (or more?) items from my tier 14? I was able to climb to 521 ilevel since then (had an old 489 head, replaced with my first tier 15 lfr item), but technically without any tier bonus. In regular ToT, we're 6/12 (going slowly, yes), and I'm third at best. I have the highest ilevel of everyone in my group, but I can't touch the hunter with tier 15 bonus (he too has 2x14 + 2x15), and a warlock which isn't spectacular, sometimes beating me, sometimes not.

I try to gear checking Mr.Robot, I'm capped correctly (hit/haste plateau), fully enchanted, yet I feel I should be putting out more. I'm a good spriest (in all modesty), and I kinda expected to go lower and lower on the charts, but still... Coming back to that other dude beating me, what should I do now? I go lower to do higher?

(lol, gotta love 183 views and no one replying, oh how I love making posts on mmo-champion )

[Daetur]

Moved to the priest forums, as the value of tier bonuses versus item level upgrades can be very different based on your class, and this is a priest-specific situation.

[laplacedemon]

(lol, gotta love 183 views and no one replying, oh how I love making posts on mmo-champion )

That's probably your question doesn't provide enough information. With only saying "That person had 512 ilvl with T14 2p & T15 2p, I have T15 2p. He did 15-30k dps more than me, so should I wear old tier pieces?" you can't get an accurate answer. Different bosses, any add fights, which talents, DoT uptimes, how much Mind Blast per minute you cast, how you clip MF(I) and a million other things changes everything. I sincerely doubt going even 2p+2p would make you gain 15k dps out of the blue, so instead look at what you might be doing wrong and what the other priest was doing right.

[Kalmah]

There's barely any info. Maybe the other guy just played better?

Also when comparing gear level, it's important to keep in mind that secondary stat allocation, trinkets and legendary meta all have a significant impact.

[DiGG]

I gave plenty of info, sadly I forgot his name, I can't show you his armory against mine. I whispered him after the Horridon kill, he told me he "purposefully" was spec'ed FDCL+DI, I was PW:I+PI, that's pretty much all the extra info I can give. As saying he played better... I can't judge that, except that I really push and try my best to be on top every time, even though I never expect to be, since we were told shadow priests are supposed to be low on charts (the heroic tier 15 chart, showing shadow priest before last rank).

My question is legitimate in that asking if tier bonuses outgrows higher ilevel, kinda straightforward (no matter the class/spec/talents with *equal dedication and efficiency* from the players). I'm currently uploading on YouTube our first Durumu (10N) kill from last night, I will link it to you and you tell me how "ok" or not so ok I was. (I know I could have done a bit more)

[Viromand]

I gave plenty of info, sadly I forgot his name, I can't show you his armory against mine. I whispered him after the Horridon kill, he told me he "purposefully" was spec'ed FDCL+DI, I was PW:I+PI, that's pretty much all the extra info I can give. As saying he played better... I can't judge that, except that I really push and try my best to be on top every time, even though I never expect to be, since we were told shadow priests are supposed to be low on charts (the heroic tier 15 chart, showing shadow priest before last rank).

My question is legitimate in that asking if tier bonuses outgrows higher ilevel, kinda straightforward (no matter the class/spec/talents with *equal dedication and efficiency* from the players). I'm currently uploading on YouTube our first Durumu (10N) kill from last night, I will link it to you and you tell me how "ok" or not so ok I was. (I know I could have done a bit more)

First of all having 2 t14 with 2 t15 is really nice and even worht it dropping a few itemlvl.

And you didnt give any infomartion except. you told us about 4 items he has that you dont have. Did he have t15 helmet with legendary metagem? what about trinkets, did he have leishens? what items do you have that give you such a high ilvl. Do you have 522 trinkets or weapons? Having 517 ilvl says nothing if you have a back, rings, bracers, neck stuff like that on high ilvl, but maybe 496 weapon or low trinkets.

What about dotuptimes? which part of lfr were you? What boss did he specc FDCL DI, and you PW:I+PI. on a single target or multitarget boss?

for example if he has the leishen trinket, and really knows how to use it plus the 2piece t15, 15-30k ahead of you is fine than.

But till we dont know you will never know.

Do you have logs to see how you uptimes are?

Did you focus just on dmg and ignore all mechanics on the bosses or did you run out of stuff try to avoid mechanics?

LFR dmg is hard to compare aswell and with practicly you just saying he did 15-30k more than me and has different items. With that information its impossible to say why. It could be anything you not beeing as good as him to he ignoring all mechanics, or even jsut have 2 better trinkets than you and uses them better.

[DiGG]

He had tier 15 head without legendary metagem (522). Can't tell you which trinket he had. I had high level cuz I got 528 chest and gloves and weapon.

I was in first quarter of ToT lfr with him. When I asked him after the Horridon kill (as I said) how was he beating me so hard, his only answer was FDCL+DI. I get the impression he was running the whole lfr with those talents (how often do you change talents in a freakin lfr hehe). So let's say he was FDCL+DI the whole way, while I was PW:I+PI the whole way.

I don't have logs for that...

The first 2 fights I played with respect to the mechanics, so I moved accordingly, only on Council I "cheated" and went dotting everything at the expense of mechanics. On Council I did much better that way of course, but he still beaten me by the same margin.

I ran the four lfrs, and with PW:I+PI all the way, I was in top 7 in the last quarter, top 6 in the third quarter, top 5 in the second quarter, and top 4 in the first. It's quite constant in a way... Mind you, it's lfr, I'm not expecting everyone to push and do max output (although some will push and forget mechanics to rape the charts), so all in all I'm satisfied with my output. Just that other spriest that made me questioned how could he constantly do 2% more than me with lesser ilevel. I just hope I can get my hands on a second piece of tier 15, to start pilling dps a bit more.

Here's the video:


All the other dps in the video have less ilevel than me, but they ALL have full tier 15 bonus, tier 14+15, or the dk having full t14 bonus (surprisingly). Look at the dk in the end... not bad at all (although they are op, right? lol).

[Cerbz]

Logs would be able to tell the story.

I'm only using the T15 set bonus because I don't have the meta yet, and I'm only using the T14 pieces because I don't have gear to replace them yet. However, I do have the Lei Shen trinket which makes the T14 set bonus much less valuable anyway.

Talent choice is essential to optimizing DPS as well. You should NOT being using PI for Horridon, you should be using ToF. Make sure you're doing your research when it comes to choosing correct talents, though it should be fairly obvious most of the time if you know the fight.


Tips I can offer based the video:

-You're not paying enough attention to your DoTs. You should NOT have to interrupt MF:Insanity to refresh, which you not only interrupted Insanity to recast VT, you went a full 10 seconds without recasting SW:P. Make sure your DoTs have around 8-9 seconds left on them before DP+Insanity. There are times when other things are at a higher priority than refreshing a DoT when it's going to fall off, but generally speaking higher DoT uptime=higher uptime on procs=higher overall DPS.

-You're not refreshing DoTs when you get procs. Like at 5:23 you refresh your DoTs, and THEN cast PI, which is backwards.

-When you're moving and can't MF, spam SW:P. Also, if you have to do a lot of moving and won't be able to plant to cast Insanity, cast DP anyway. Don't hold on to it for 20 seconds(like you did @ 7:20) and waste all those orbs you're getting from SW: D.

-During execute phase, you want to interrupt Insanity for SW: D, but you DO NOT want to double tap it, doing so results in a DPS loss. Cast it once for an orb, and then wait for the 6 second internal CD for orb regen until you cast it again. If you're not in the middle of casting Insanity, then double tap it.


This is the best I can do without any logs, but those tips in general will net you more DPS than gear ever could.

[DiGG]

-When you're moving and can't MF, spam SW:P.

I don't get why you would want me to spam SW:P? As for the rest, I do see the difference. I didn't know that double tapping SW: D would only bring ONE shadow orb... I mean, can you beleive it, I didn't read the "If the target does not die, the cooldown is reset, but this additional Shadow Word: Death does not grant a Shadow Orb. This effect has a 6 sec cooldown." DAMN! So it means I could double tap SW: D if the first one brings me to 3 orbs, then I would do the second one before DP, or should DP then double tap SW: D... or wait for the 6 secs anyway?

[Cerbz]

I don't get why you would want me to spam SW:P? As for the rest, I do see the difference. I didn't know that double tapping SW: D would only bring ONE shadow orb... I mean, can you beleive it, I didn't read the "If the target does not die, the cooldown is reset, but this additional Shadow Word: Death does not grant a Shadow Orb. This effect has a 6 sec cooldown." DAMN! So it means I could double tap SW: D if the first one brings me to 3 orbs, then I would do the second one before DP, or should DP then double tap SW: D... or wait for the 6 secs anyway?

Spamming SW:P is more DPS than letting it tick on it's own(unless it has several buffs), and it's the only thing you can do when moving if you're not spec'd into FDCL or DI.

In the MoP beta SW: D gave you an orb for both casts, but they took it away from us like everything else cool :P

As far as another SW: D after getting your 3rd orb, you don't want to double tap it there either. Think about it this way:

-You cast SW: D which gets your triple orbed, if you cast SW: D again you're extending how low it's going to take for you to get another orb from SW: D again because you're using another GCD to cast SW: D AND you're resetting the 6 second CD. The whole idea to get orbs as fast as we can and get as much uptime on DP/Insanity as possible.


I'm not going to tell you I'm 100% positive about double tapping SW: D after your 3rd orb, but that's what logic is telling me to do in that situation. Twintop/Drye/Blackmorgrim/Woaden would likely know for sure.

[DiGG]

Ok ok... I've been SO used to ALWAYS double tap SW: D, it's gonna be hard not to do it. I can see the cooldown on the target's unitframe, but it would require a standalone tracker, just for it. How do you do it? You count, or just look at the cooldown icon, before recasting the second time?

[Cerbz]

It's entirely possible that it's better not to double tap it at all unless there's a lot of movement involved, but again, I'd have to look more into it.

As for a tracker: http://howtopriest.com/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=3746

[Viromand]

Ok now thats some info. Double tap SW even with three orbs is not that big of a dps lost tbh.
The rest yes on movement fights like durumu you should specc MF:I plus DI. Not PI. From my personal opinion, I usually do more dps with my Spriest when speccind DI on everyfight, PI to be better than DI you have to time it really good, with LMG and BL or hasteproccs. Which is ok in a normal raid but in lfr, if you dont have PI up for BL Di would almost be better. plus you get proccs while spamming SW:P. More Orbs for Insanity. try it it helped me alot but my Spriests has ilvl 521 and mostly im top 1-3 in lfr.

If you multidot, using MF:I will mostlikely resolve in loosing dots on some targets plus you not ahving 2 t15 which is really strong on multidot bosses. If you loose MF:I ticks cause you dot too much taking that talent is not as good as FDCL. On fight like Horridon, speccing MF:I and ToF, is the way to go in lfr. ToF uptime is at 80% in LFR plus you just use every DP and MF:I on the boss. And yes those books you need to change talents cost like 2gold, and totally worth it as a Spriest to change from fight to fight. mostly lvl 75 and lvl 90 talents make a huge difference depending on boss.

If he had the Leishen crit trinket plus 2piece t15, you would never have a chance on horridon/council if he uses the trinket proc correctly. I dont know how much but both of them together is SO much dps. Maybe even the strongest DPS improvement you can get with three items of all classes maybe with DemoWL plus Leishens.

[dmfg]

In 90% of situations where you have to ask "is this difference in DPS because of gear or because of play", the answer is "he played better".

Tier bonuses might be 1-2k DPS each, a better trinket or a higher ilvl weapon might be as high as 5k on a good day. None of those is going to account for anywhere close to a 15-30k difference.

[Bombino]

If it were me, and since you don't have logs for this (I think). I would log another LFR or normal raid and compare yourself to one of the top shadowpriests for that specific fight (not someone doing slightly better).

[Deleted]

Why do you wait so long with your shadowfiend? you wait for proccs, PI, pot and everything to fall off in the beginning. Shadowfiend is our only damage cd, line it up with everything.
At 4:06 you are at #3 on dps with only 0,3% behind the shaman. Until this point you did a good job. If you would continue like this you might end up at #2 because of SW, but then you get the red fog...

you start to fail almost everything, watch the video from this point and check your mistakes:
first both dots fall off but you immediately put them back on the boss, you spam mindflay with mind blast off cd, then you reveal the fog an kill it with mindspike (since the fogs fall in like 5 seconds it might be possible for you to stay on the boss, you didnt get the shadow orb from SW but thats not your fault), and then you take 5-6 seconds to target the boss again. At this point your VT is about to fall off and mind blast is off cooldown for ~5 seconds, you wait another 5 seconds casting nothing, then start to refresh VT but interrupt it. you start a mindflay but interrupt again before the first tick. you move another 5 seconds without casting anything and then go for a halo. Also: at this point you are pretty much alone in the red fog and you panic because you are at low health. you start several cast but interrupt them again until you reveal the next fog.

Summary for these ~50 seconds: 1-2 dot refreshes, 3-4 mindspikes, 1 halo and maybe a few mindflay ticks.

If you have the red fog and have to damage the fog monster things: refresh dots on the boss, place yourself on the first add (you did all that)
look out for the other marks on the plattform. after the first add: shadowword pain on the boss, speedshield yourself and run the fuck to the next one (be ready to disperse and flame everyone because they are too slow ) vampiric embrace (there is no other good place for it on durumu), refresh dots on the boss and cast mindblast, second add already dead? awesome, use goblin jump to the next on and run closer to the boss (but never stop and wait!) on the way push all your instants: SW:P, halo, shield, prayer of mending. SW:P, SW:P. mindblast the third add, check dots on the boss and damage the add or boss, but always press your buttons!

if you play this phase faster, its easier for the healer (our best was a phase with less than 20 stacks, in your red phase you go up to 30) and you have a lot more time to damage the boss afterwards until the next maze starts (which is always bad from a shadow PoV, you will never keep up with melees, shamans who cast while walking or warlocks)

in the second light spectrum you cast DP on the add, this might be good if your guid is struggling with the boss, but is a dps loss for you. and again a long time without dots on the boss...

it seems like you know what to do but struggle with execution when dealing with boss abilities.

[Viromand]

In 90% of situations where you have to ask "is this difference in DPS because of gear or because of play", the answer is "he played better".

Tier bonuses might be 1-2k DPS each, a better trinket or a higher ilvl weapon might be as high as 5k on a good day. None of those is going to account for anywhere close to a 15-30k difference.

The first part is true.

2t15 is good but with leishens trinket its alot of dps if you use it correctly, especially in first lfr part.

[Qualia]

The first part is true.

2t15 is good but with leishens trinket its alot of dps if you use it correctly, especially in first lfr part.

2pc t15, the way it is now, is actually lowering DPS gain of any procs. Gonna get fixed in 5.3, though.

[Cerbz]

2pc t15, the way it is now, is actually lowering DPS gain of any procs. Gonna get fixed in 5.3, though.

Not entirely true. We're only losing haste buffs from the 2pc, other buffs work as they should.

[Qualia]

^ True, seems I was under wrong assumptions in theorycrafting regarding that. I apologize.