[Pre-Beta] Havoc Discussion

[wordup]

Then yeah, I figured for FotS in builds with Demonic Appetite, else no.

Then I should trade out the .7 multiplier for a .63 multiplier?

Would switch the .7 for .65~ multiplier now since it's confirmed, further than that will take a bit more time to check through. Will likely hit FB & TG builds a bit and also amp up DB a little more

[Mefistophelis]

Your videos Vanyali, they make me happy. Especially the Strands of the Ancients, which I apparently missed earlier. Keep on making for those of us that were not lucky enough to get into Alpha. Would the new Demonic, coupled with the 100% leech talent, actually give you a reliable way to heal your self in oh shit situations? Like say you could delay CN or EB so you can use it in some high damage taken phase to counteract it. Something like Fel Reaver ground pound?

[ChakanDH]

Cool. Since last post I built in an APPROXIMATE Momentum multiplier, and toyed with a build of my own. Keep in mind that this is only Single Target, as I still have to rebuild the AOE stuff. These are all over about 5 minutes so that I could include Meta, with no artifact talents (Feast of Souls being the only exception, as it's what powers CD reduction builds), and I tried to keep the logic as reasonable as possible.

Build #1: FM/Prep/Fel//Momentum/DB/FB = 120,464 dps

Build #2: DA/Prep/FB//Nemesis/DB/CB = 107,717 dps

Build #3: FM/FE/Blood//Momentum/MotG/FB = 91,493 dps
((Note: there's no way for me to actually figure for being caught out of range right now, which I believe is the intent of this build))

Build #4: FM/Prep/Fel//Momentum/MotG/FB = 100,696 dps

Build #5: DA/Prep/FB//Demonic/UP/FB = 100,073 dps

Build #6: DA/Prep/Fel//Demonic/UP/FB = 99,621 dps

That's it for now, I'll recheck these builds once I've got the Cleave/AOE calcs setup.

Build 5 is what I've been using lately - excuse my ignorance, but whats the optimal rotation for build 1 likely to be?

[Orloth]

Use Vengeful Retreat and Fel Rush on CD to maintain good Momentum uptime, use Felblade when availabe, else fill with CS. It's a Demon Blades build that aims to fill EVERY blank GCD with either Fury gain talents or CS from Fury generated and it actually goes past that benchmark. Not sure if it can actually be executed to that level, but it might be fun to try.

[Warstar]

Boss size is going to make a difference when it comes to Momentum. Fel Rush moves you out pretty far so a boss the size of Tyrant for example you will miss attacks.

Also, was the fact that with Momentum the ability that procs Momentum does not have Momentum applied to it factored in? Minor dps change but still it's something.

And, I feel like with the change to Felblade making First Blood stronger in a lot of builds that that's going to kill DHs mastery even further.

[ChakanDH]

Because the recharge for fel rush is 5 seconds shorter than retreat, are you manually running out to rush back in at times? Its a shame that the buff doesn't have a stacking duration, so that you can retreat out, then rush back in with a full 8 seconds to go ham.

[Orloth]

Yes, Momentum builds should not be used when mobility is going to be a problem. That's likely going to be a constant for us.

I figured Momentum as a flat %uptime * 20% Modifier. This is VERY APPROXIMATE for a lot of reasons that are self evident. I'm hoping the error up and the error down cancel out somewhat, but until we get a simcraft build going, it's all I'm even going to attempt.

And that depends on the scaling value they decide to pick for it. I doubt it will stay at 250.

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Fel Rush can stack to two charges, so when you've already got Momentum from VR, just wait for Momentum to drop to FR, no loss of CD time.

Edit: Sorry, misunderstood. No, the build assumes that the boss is big enough for you to be back in Melee range fairly quickly by animation canceling VR or Fel Rushing to the other side of the hitbox. If the boss's hitbox is small, this build won't be viable.

[ChakanDH]

Yes, Momentum builds should not be used when mobility is going to be a problem. That's likely going to be a constant for us.

I figured Momentum as a flat %uptime * 20% Modifier. This is VERY APPROXIMATE for a lot of reasons that are self evident. I'm hoping the error up and the error down cancel out somewhat, but until we get a simcraft build going, it's all I'm even going to attempt.

And that depends on the scaling value they decide to pick for it. I doubt it will stay at 250.

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Fel Rush can stack to two charges, so when you've already got Momentum from VR, just wait for Momentum to drop to FR, no loss of CD time.

Edit: Sorry, misunderstood. No, the build assumes that the boss is big enough for you to be back in Melee range fairly quickly by animation canceling VR or Fel Rushing to the other side of the hitbox. If the boss's hitbox is small, this build won't be viable.

Cool, thanks for that. Ha, makes it a little hard to test on the dummies in Pandaria

Honestly, I'm sold on build 5. There is some skill elements with the animation cancelling, and it just feels like it flows well. Hard to put my finger on it, but for me it ticks all the boxes.

[Vanyali]

Your videos Vanyali, they make me happy. Especially the Strands of the Ancients, which I apparently missed earlier. Keep on making for those of us that were not lucky enough to get into Alpha. Would the new Demonic, coupled with the 100% leech talent, actually give you a reliable way to heal your self in oh shit situations? Like say you could delay CN or EB so you can use it in some high damage taken phase to counteract it. Something like Fel Reaver ground pound?

Yeah, you could do that provided the wait wasn't *too* long.. waiting past ~10s would be losing another use of it. Though, if you're gonna die without it, would be better to delay and miss one of course

[Slirith]

Wouldn't be surprised if they nerfed the "animation canceling" in some way.

[grizzlysaurusrex]

Would the demon blades talent be easier for people to swallow if it also gave your autoattacks a 5-10 yard range?

[Dimzum]

Demonic for AoE and ST right now. Likely the DB for ST boss, heavy movement would probably end up being Demonic or Momentum.. tbh, there's not much to test for build effectiveness with heroic bosses falling straight over when you touch them.

I was worried that was the case with heroics. I'm guessing you haven't been able to get into any of the raids.

I'd love to see how things fall out when Challenge Modes start opening up. I am happy to see Demonic fairing well. From what I've seen, that looks to be the a fun rotation.

[Vanyali]

I was worried that was the case with heroics. I'm guessing you haven't been able to get into any of the raids.

I'd love to see how things fall out when Challenge Modes start opening up. I am happy to see Demonic fairing well. From what I've seen, that looks to be the a fun rotation.

I have, but there's been server issues each time so it's difficult to tell.

Demonic was massively, massively OP on AoE.. but it's since been nerfed. I did a very early momentum build when BD was on it for dragon, and nemesis on the same boss. Wasn't too bad at all with Dragon because you never moved out of melee.

I want to say I did a few DB pulls on the last raid that was open (the ST one), but it had enough movement that it was annoying to try to keep up.

[grizzlysaurusrex]

Since it's everyone's favorite thing to talk about... what if blade dance (and throw glaive?) were tuned to be an AoE resource generator instead of spender? Its tooltip could read: "and if it strikes more than one target, generates 30 fury" and First Blood could have the current damage increase while also making it generate resource even if it only strikes one target.

[Baelroc]

I just really, really want Blade Dance to be a rotational ability. (I know it is with First Blood, but its high fury cost pretty much makes Chaos Strike never usable, or very lightly used).

Remove some of Chaos Strike's damage and give it to BD while also lowering its fury cost.

[Warstar]

Since it's everyone's favorite thing to talk about... what if blade dance (and throw glaive?) were tuned to be an AoE resource generator instead of spender? Its tooltip could read: "and if it strikes more than one target, generates 30 fury" and First Blood could have the current damage increase while also making it generate resource even if it only strikes one target.

Except... what would Blade Dance be used to generate fury for?

[grizzlysaurusrex]

Except... what would Blade Dance be used to generate fury for?

More Chaos Strikes and Eye Beam (it could generate more fury than Demon's Bite? not sure). It would be similar to MoP Wind Walker with spinning crane kick as a Chi Generator and more or less having only single target spenders (pre Fists of Fury doing area damage), so it could work here too.

I dunno. I thematically like the idea of physical abilities being generators and chaos/magic abilities being spenders for Demon Hunter.

[Dimzum]

I dunno. I thematically like the idea of physical abilities being generators and chaos/magic abilities being spenders for Demon Hunter.

I too like that idea. I am torn on having separate abilities for single target/multi target, but I think a nice solution could be from talents.

Have Master of the Glaive generate fury if it hits 3 or more targets.
Blade Dance now does Chaos Damage (increase the cooldown to compensate?) change this out with First Blood?

This would remind me of the WW AoE rotation from MoP (didn't play much with him in WoD) where you would use SCK, keep up your buffs/debuffs with Chi and then using FoF on CD where possible.

[Unkhrahuun the Atoned]

Would the demon blades talent be easier for people to swallow if it also gave your autoattacks a 5-10 yard range?

I think people would stop treating it like it's some kind of disease at first glance if instead of taking away the ability and making it passive they replaced it with a different ability that still took away the GCD capped nature of the spec without removing an active ability.

Something like a CD Fury generator with 2 charges and a short CD (that generates more Fury, a set amount of Fury) in the same vein of what Enhance is getting out of Boulderfist for Rockbiter.

Not advocating for the removal of Demon Blades, because it seems to mostly be a very loud yet small group of people who think the ability is somehow toxic since it "dumbs the spec down" in their opinion, when ultimately it's an option, not mandatory by any means. That said, watching some of Vanyali's play with it, it seems it's Fury generation really isn't that awful. I imagine once you get enough Haste and Crit, it could become an extremely active playstyle still, since you're still auto attacking while performing abilities and such (as far as i know) and therefore still generating Fury WHILE spending it.

So many Chaos Strikes.

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I just really, really want Blade Dance to be a rotational ability. (I know it is with First Blood, but its high fury cost pretty much makes Chaos Strike never usable, or very lightly used).

Remove some of Chaos Strike's damage and give it to BD while also lowering its fury cost.

It's actually not all that awful if Vanyali's videos are anything to go by. If you take Prepared and do that god forsaken animation cancelling, you'll have plenty of Fury for some Chaos Strikes, and can get even more out if they crit.

On that topic, I wonder if the animation cancelling is intended. They'd need to break it via VR to show it isn't if that's the case. Though we may never know since Blizz doesn't like talking to Havoc Demon Hunters -.-

[Warstar]

More Chaos Strikes and Eye Beam (it could generate more fury than Demon's Bite? not sure). It would be similar to MoP Wind Walker with spinning crane kick as a Chi Generator and more or less having only single target spenders (pre Fists of Fury doing area damage), so it could work here too.

I dunno. I thematically like the idea of physical abilities being generators and chaos/magic abilities being spenders for Demon Hunter.

Blade Dance generating fury would be too much. A reduction in cost is one thing but generating fury is too far even for me. If it generated fury it would make any talent but Demon Blades redundant.

I think people would stop treating it like it's some kind of disease at first glance if instead of taking away the ability and making it passive they replaced it with a different ability that still took away the GCD capped nature of the spec without removing an active ability.

Something like a CD Fury generator with 2 charges and a short CD (that generates more Fury, a set amount of Fury) in the same vein of what Enhance is getting out of Boulderfist for Rockbiter.

Not advocating for the removal of Demon Blades, because it seems to mostly be a very loud yet small group of people who think the ability is somehow toxic since it "dumbs the spec down" in their opinion, when ultimately it's an option, not mandatory by any means. That said, watching some of Vanyali's play with it, it seems it's Fury generation really isn't that awful. I imagine once you get enough Haste and Crit, it could become an extremely active playstyle still, since you're still auto attacking while performing abilities and such (as far as i know) and therefore still generating Fury WHILE spending it.

So many Chaos Strikes.

The idea behind Demon Blades isn't necessary to dumb the spec down at all. The idea is to be at a point where you can still fill every GCD with an ability. Essentially you're trading the ability to use Demon's Bite for other hard hitting abilities where you can fill your rotation with a Chaos Strike instead of that Demon's Bite and you don't have to worry about it because you're passively generating fury. If anything the spec is way more involved than not using it because instead of 3 buttons that you push you use all buttons.

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And btw you don't HAVE to animation cancel. It's completely fine to simply VR backwards over the boss or to the side.