Suggested Roll the Bones change.

[ymirsson]

Otherwise, they just won't ever be able to deal with the possibility of 3/6 buff and endless 1-rolls happening, making the class much harder to tune reasonably. We've known since the start that the swings in damage were incredibly wide. This causes a problem balancing for shorter fights, and for PvP.

And that's the problem and the solution: spec performance is not decided by short fights.
Since Blizzard "sees the big picture" they do not need to make RtB "fair" for every single fight.

[Maelstrom51]

RtB causes huge variance in dps in both short and long fights (>50% difference between very good and very bad luck), it's just more pronounced in shorter fights.

I am honestly surprised to see so many people defending the current RtB implementation.

[shaunika123]

I disagree since with average RNG we are behind most other classes, with bad RNG we are one of the worst specs in the game, and with good RNG we are upper middle.

that's just because outlaw got nerfed

it's not "Punishing" its just not as good in general

[Notter]

RtB causes huge variance in dps in both short and long fights (>50% difference between very good and very bad luck), it's just more pronounced in shorter fights.

I am honestly surprised to see so many people defending the current RtB implementation.

Look, i don't want to be those people that are saying "git gud", cause obviously it's a very RNG spec.
but I have been playing it for a bit now, and I don't feel like bad rolls completely destroy me.

i think knowing what buffs to keep, and how to play around it, reduces the RNG aspect by a large margin.

so yeah, sometimes i have low dps, happens. but the vast majority of the time, i am floating on the average outlaw dps or higher.

that being said, i think the recent nerfs to outlaw are the real problem with the spec.
cause right now, even when rolling 6, i don't feel we're "amazing".

[Faenskap]

I'd like a slight change to RtB, yes

I don't have any logs, so you'll have to take my word for it:
I did mythic EoA, on last boss I rolled all 6 buffs, and peaked at 320k, but the fight ended with 250k-270k, I don't remember exactly
I did mythic DHT and on last boss, I only managed a measly 140k, because I rolled 1 buff throughout the entire fight

Did both dungeons with an ilvl of 843

I truly enjoy Outlaw and I'd like to play it. However, due to RtB's RNG, I fear I won't be able to pull the dps I should be with the ilvl I have (which is now 845, so not great). Assa and sub are not options for me, as I don't enjoy those specs.

And I guess playing SnD isn't viable either? RtB is fun and I'd prefer it over SnD, but I feel it'll look like I slack on dps when I keep on rolling 1 buff. Ah, confusion

[Deleted]

My proposed changes to rtb:

1. rtb has now only 3 buffs
2. still can roll 1, 2 or 3 for the "class fantasy" style of the ability
3. Make an abilty CD or talent cd for RTB to roll 6 buffs next cast.

I'd recommend true bearing not being in the 3 potential buffs from point 1. this can help balance the class by not having adren rush up for days and days if you wanted.
The 3 I recommend are jolly roger/broadsides/buried treasure to give you an energy regen feeling that you have slice n dice up but a little bit stronger. But also I'd imagine the percentage chance of gaining 1, 2 or 3 buffs will be changed. The point here is having 2 buff should feel about right, having 3 buff is a slight dps increase but a dps loss if you are just going to fish for it every time.

IMO getting 6 buff rtb feels great, it seems like a cd to put out a lot of damage, our problem is we get it at a chance of under 2%? it happens for me at the most inconvenience of times, and hardly ever in a raid boss fight. It is very tough to balance the damage outlaw right now.

With 6 buff being a controlled cd the devs can then balance outlaw around how much damage we put out during it. They can balance how we line it up with adren rush or/and curse of the dreadblades cause true bearing will give us a 2nd adren rush from 6 buff rtb cd. This will be done through tuning the damage of abilities, increasing/reducing the cooldowns of adren rush and curse of the dreadblades, and choosing what cd time the 6 buff rtb should have. Also tuning how much each buff gives.

I am sure there is problems here I can't see. Also a problem with this proposal is the dreaded phrase "class fantasy" since rolling the perfect dice combo is random irl and not a fixed thing to happen once every few minutes right?

[Voij]

There are 6 possible 1-buffs you can get. There is 1 possible 6-buff you can get.
There are 15 different combinations for 2-buffs you can get. There are 20 different combinations for 3-buffs you can get.

The "randomness" of what you get out of it and how it affects your playstyle would be fully present if you eliminated both the 1-buff and the 6-buff possibility. The outcome would still have the "roll of a die" feel to it and you'd still have to deal with what you get.
So in terms of class fantasy, neither the 1-buff nor the 6-buff are actually neccessary. [Unless you really want the "luck of the draw" aspect to come in aswell, which is just a terrible thing to balance around.]

With this in mind, I'd personally prefer to see them go with only allowing 2-buff and 3-buff results from RtB, whilest also giving the ability a 10-second cooldown. There would still be some variance between the effectiveness of the buffs, but it would be much smaller than before. You'd also have the chance to reroll if you'd like to fish for an awesome 3-buff, but you wouldn't need to do it again and again and again and again and... as you would with the 1-buffs. Instead, you'll have to stick with a "bad" 2-buff which would still be fairly decent overall.

[Gasper]

My suggestion is to have a talent somewhere called stacked dice. An old-style lone wolf buff that can be swapped ooc. It would grant the user the select buffin addition to what was rolled, while roll the bones is active.

[ymirsson]

My suggestion is to have a talent somewhere called stacked dice. An old-style lone wolf buff that can be swapped ooc. It would grant the user the select buffin addition to what was rolled, while roll the bones is active.

Just call it True Bearing then.

[prwraith]

There's it litterally nothing worse than wasting an entire curse of the dread blades to re-roll true bearing.


I lose all will to even participate in the encounter.

[Eazy]

What about:

Roll The Bones
Requires 5 CP
Gives you 2 random buffs for 42 seconds.
30 seconds CD.

[ymirsson]

Why not respec if you don't like RtB?

[Blayke]

There's it litterally nothing worse than wasting an entire curse of the dread blades to re-roll true bearing.

Which is why infinite re-rolling is eventually a dps loss. Every time you re-roll, the benefit you gain from the hypothetical 2+ you might get over the rt you skipped gets a little smaller. Eventually, after so many re-rolls, the gain will evaporate completely.

No one knows exactly how many re-rolls it takes to get to that point, it may be quite a few. I still wonder if it's possible to theory craft the number of re-rolls it would take before plugging in a run through (before resuming re-rolling, I mean) now becomes a better choice.

Until that day comes (if it ever does), only you can decide how many re-rolls are worth it. The number is not infinite, contrary to what some people seem to think. Eventually you reach a point where no combination of buffs will be enough to offset the damage loss of that many skipped rt's. And I agree, wasting those CotDB buffs genuinely sucks.

It may provide some comfort to know that even if you never re-roll (not advisable, but still an option i suppose), you're still ahead of slice and dice in nearly all circumstances.

[Speaker]

What if they changed it so that whenever you roll, instead of getting the buff with the most rolls, you get all the buffs that rolled. This would mean you would have a very low chance of getting a single buff, instead of having a very high chance of getting a single buff. They can then tweak numbers to compensate for having more buffs on average.

[ymirsson]

Which is why infinite re-rolling is eventually a dps loss. Every time you re-roll, the benefit you gain from the hypothetical 2+ you might get over the rt you skipped gets a little smaller. Eventually, after so many re-rolls, the gain will evaporate completely.

Infinite rerolling is also an eventual DPS gain. Because 2+ includes 3 and 6 buffs. Ever done the maths?

[prwraith]

Infinite rerolling is also an eventual DPS gain. Because 2+ includes 3 and 6 buffs. Ever done the maths?

Infinite re-rolling makes little rogues soul die a little bit each time.

[Blayke]

Infinite rerolling is also an eventual DPS gain. Because 2+ includes 3 and 6 buffs. Ever done the maths?

Have you ever done the math? I you have I'd love to see it (I'm being sincere here).

In the meantime, your assertion simply makes no sense. Consider:

If you you get a single buff, your options for your next finisher are: 1) keep it and use run through, or 2) re-roll. We agree on that much at least, right?

Now, if you re-roll and get 2+, then that was clearly a dps increase over option 1, probably a really big one. Why? Because the damage loss from skipping that 1 rt is more than offset by the damage increase from those 2 buffs. Again, I'm pretty sure we still agree up to this point.

Now supposing you have to re-roll twice to get to 2+? It is generally agreed that that, too, is a dps increase over rt, since even the loss of 2 rt's is offset by the benefit of 2+. But it is a slightly smaller increase, because you have to factor in the lost damage of 2 rt's as opposed to 1 rt.

And so on down the line. 3 re-rolls, while still probably a dps increase over rt, is slightly less of an increase over 2 rr's. 4 is less than 3. Logic tells us that eventually you get to a point where no combination of rtb buffs will offset the dps loss of the same number of rt's you had to forego to eventually get those buffs. And theory crafting aside, eventually most people just say fuck it after a point and just use run through because they just get frustrated at wasting dozens of cp's and potential rt's.

My point here is NOT to stop re-rolling. Rather, I wonder if there isn't some way to theory craft where it might be optimal to work in a run through in between re-rolls. After 5? After 10? I don't know enough about theory crafting to answer that question. But maybe someone like Stjern or Aethys does.

[ymirsson]

Have you ever done the math? I you have I'd love to see it (I'm being sincere here).

In the meantime, your assertion simply makes no sense. Consider:

If you you get a single buff, your options for your next finisher are: 1) keep it and use run through, or 2) re-roll. We agree on that much at least, right?

Now, if you re-roll and get 2+, then that was clearly a dps increase over option 1, probably a really big one. Why? Because the damage loss from skipping that 1 rt is more than offset by the damage increase from those 2 buffs. Again, I'm pretty sure we still agree up to this point.

Now supposing you have to re-roll twice to get to 2+? It is generally agree that that, too, is a dps increase over rt, since even the loss of 2 rt's is offset by the benefit of 2+. But it is a slightly smaller increase, because you have to factor in the lost damage of 2 rt's as opposed to 1 rt.

And so on down the line. 3 re-rolls, while still probably a dps increase of rt, is slight less of an increase over 2 rr's. 4 is less than 3. Logic tells us that eventually you get to a point where no combination of rtb buffs will offset the dps loss of the same number of rt's you had to forego to eventually get those buffs. And theory crafting aside, eventually most people just say fuck it after a point and just use run through because they just get frustrated at wasting dozens of cp's and potential rt's.

My point here is NOT to stop re-rolling. Rather, I wonder if there isn't some way to theory craft where it might be optimal to work in a run through in between re-rolls. After 5? After 10? I don't know enough about theory crafting to answer that question. But maybe someone like Stjern or Aethys does.

Logic tells us that the probability of rolling 20 1 buffs in a row is simply that low that you would never consider it.
Your own assertion is not flawed, it's just not feasible to ask that question.

In the meantime, tolling one 6 buff is giving you 42 seconds of above average DPS to compensate for more then 6 consecutive 1 rolls, considering the fact that buff stacking almost always is more beneficial then having those buffs sequentially.

[Blayke]

Logic tells us that the probability of rolling 20 1 buffs in a row is simply that low that you would never consider it.
Your own assertion is not flawed, it's just not feasible to ask that question.

In the meantime, tolling one 6 buff is giving you 42 seconds of above average DPS to compensate for more then 6 consecutive 1 rolls, considering the fact that buff stacking almost always is more beneficial then having those buffs sequentially.

I agree with you 100%. As things stand right now, holding your breath and re-rolling til we get something good is probably your best bet. But it's so.....inelegant. I just wonder if it's possible to sim a sweet spot with this. But it will have to be done by someone a lot smarter than me.

[Voij]

Have you ever done the math? I you have I'd love to see it (I'm being sincere here).

In the meantime, your assertion simply makes no sense. Consider:

If you you get a single buff, your options for your next finisher are: 1) keep it and use run through, or 2) re-roll. We agree on that much at least, right?

Now, if you re-roll and get 2+, then that was clearly a dps increase over option 1, probably a really big one. Why? Because the damage loss from skipping that 1 rt is more than offset by the damage increase from those 2 buffs. Again, I'm pretty sure we still agree up to this point.

Now supposing you have to re-roll twice to get to 2+? It is generally agreed that that, too, is a dps increase over rt, since even the loss of 2 rt's is offset by the benefit of 2+. But it is a slightly smaller increase, because you have to factor in the lost damage of 2 rt's as opposed to 1 rt.

And so on down the line. 3 re-rolls, while still probably a dps increase over rt, is slightly less of an increase over 2 rr's. 4 is less than 3. Logic tells us that eventually you get to a point where no combination of rtb buffs will offset the dps loss of the same number of rt's you had to forego to eventually get those buffs. And theory crafting aside, eventually most people just say fuck it after a point and just use run through because they just get frustrated at wasting dozens of cp's and potential rt's.

My point here is NOT to stop re-rolling. Rather, I wonder if there isn't some way to theory craft where it might be optimal to work in a run through in between re-rolls. After 5? After 10? I don't know enough about theory crafting to answer that question. But maybe someone like Stjern or Aethys does.

This discussion reminds me of the Gambler's Fallacy. Yes, the n-th reroll will be worse than having used Run Through n times. That, however, is not the situation you are facing when actually playing.
When you are playing, your choice is not "reroll x times or use x Run Throughs", it is "reroll or use Run Through". [Quick note: This is only the case outside of AR+CotDB, where you give up on rerolling in order to maximise number of Run Throughs.]
Whenever you need to choose between rerolling or using Run Through, rerolling is the bigger damage increase if you had a bad single-buff.

If you want, you can calculate how much each specific 2+ buff is worth, then multiply it by the chance it has to appear, then calculate the in total damage done between this 2+ buff and the single buff you had.
It gets slightly more difficult when you need to factor in the damage your 1-buff grants you based on time it has left, but that's what these Sims have done and it's how we managed to end up with these reroll-guidelines.