Shoulder Questions

[Phavian]

Hi Guys,

I have not had much luck with getting my tier shoulders, so I purchased the PvP ones.

Ruthless Gladiator's Scaled Shoulders

I had been using:

Pauldrons of the Great Ettin

I made an attempt at the heroic ones last week, but that didn't work out, and I will make another attempt this week, if I am unlucky again.

My question is, does the difference in strength make up for the loss of Crit/Mastery from the 359 shoulders?

I will reforge as soon as the server comes back up, using either wow-reforge or mr robot.

Oh, here is me:

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...avian/advanced

Thank you very much for your help, I had to remove a couple of "." as I have not posted often enough to post links, sorry.

---------- Post added 2011-10-25 at 01:34 PM ----------

Thank You Malthanis.

[Butosai]

pauldrons of the great ettin are better if you are using apparatus and/or if you have the heroic ettin shoulders.

[Phavian]

I have Apparatus, why does that make the 359 shoulders better?

[Ilivath]

Crit rating.

[Fhi]

Here's a very rough way to determine if a gear is better - the most accurate way would be for you to sim your character with your current gear. But if you want to eyeball upgrades, Apparatus notwithstanding (as someone pointed out, if you have that, you want the pauldrons), strength is around 3 times the value of mastery, the second best stat. The pvp shoulders have around 70 more mastery, which means you want at least 210 more mastery for the 359 to be better. 149 mastery and 169 crit *may* be equivalent to 210 mastery (again, you're just eyeballing, the most accurate way is to sim), but since you have the apparatus, the 359 *probably* pulls ahead.

As a general rule, a 359 pve piece is about equivalent to a 384 pvp piece. This does not count any bonuses.

[Deleted]

just checked your armory your in prot spec that said your stil using ettin shoulders to tank with?

anyway yea definitely ettin's the other thing is that when other people inspect you you either have to go through explaining why pvp are better even though it's like <1% better instead of ettin's which has crit and mastery.

also the ettins don't have the problem of most pallies this tier at dps of caping expertise really easily. pvp shoulders are another source of expertise you don't "probabbly" don't need especialy if you ever got your hnds on a heart of rage.

[ghostomc]

i dont really understand why ppl seem to think that "359 shoulders are better then 384 pvp shoulders" for ret.
the amount of STR difference makes the pvp shoulders by far superior

only time id say to switch is once you get some 378 shoulders, then the str loss isnt a big deal.
shouldnt worry about stacking crit for apparatus unless your very unlucky with gear selection.
with raid buffs i usually sit at 17% crit chance with talents and hammers i always get my stacks up high enough for my burst phase.

[Butosai]

i dont really understand why ppl seem to think that "359 shoulders are better then 384 pvp shoulders" for ret.
the amount of STR difference makes the pvp shoulders by far superior

only time id say to switch is once you get some 378 shoulders, then the str loss isnt a big deal.
shouldnt worry about stacking crit for apparatus unless your very unlucky with gear selection.
with raid buffs i usually sit at 17% crit chance with talents and hammers i always get my stacks up high enough for my burst phase.

expertise on pvp shoulders is un needed. the gain of crit and mastery is more beneficial than expertise and resilience

now if you were to be using pvp 2 peice that would be different, and more complicated depending what you were replacing where and if you were or were not losing t12 set bonuses

[Phavian]

Sorry, I ended up tanking a BH last night after raid... so I logged in Prot spec.

Yes, I do tank with the Ettins for now, my tank set is made up of the left overs after our main tanks get their fill, so Prot gear is REALLY an after thought for me. (I do tank Beth every week for some reason...)

I can add a second PvP piece to get the 2P set bonus, and retain the current tier bonus as well. I was thinking of that last night actually. I already use the PvP back, as I found the Rep Back to be less then stellar.

So.... If I add the STR bonus from the PvP 2p, then the shoulders come out a clear winner don't they?

[Butosai]

Sorry, I ended up tanking a BH last night after raid... so I logged in Prot spec.

Yes, I do tank with the Ettins for now, my tank set is made up of the left overs after our main tanks get their fill, so Prot gear is REALLY an after thought for me. (I do tank Beth every week for some reason...)

I can add a second PvP piece to get the 2P set bonus, and retain the current tier bonus as well. I was thinking of that last night actually. I already use the PvP back, as I found the Rep Back to be less then stellar.

So.... If I add the STR bonus from the PvP 2p, then the shoulders come out a clear winner don't they?

ya, gloves would be the best 2nd peice

[Fhi]

So.... If I add the STR bonus from the PvP 2p, then the shoulders come out a clear winner don't they?

Then yes, the +70 is yum. Will last you until you can replace both with 378.

[Deleted]

Today i was thinking to replace the 353 shoulders from troll dungeons with rag tanking shoulders, simmed it up and it showed if i use the rag shoulders i loose around 200 dps.
So yeh..i even think the pvp ones are worse

[Deleted]

Then yes, the +70 is yum. Will last you until you can replace both with 378.

yep thats a big thing to leave out of the comparison do you already have the 384 gloves and what are your current gloves as if you actualy have some 378 pve gloves it just became part of the comparison as you will do best to compared the combination glove+shoulder due to 2pc stre bonus.

[Phavian]

I do not currently have the PvP gloves, I will have to buy them Tuesday if the shoulders and or helm don't drop. I have the 378 Valor gloves on right now.