1. #1

    Boomkin help (WoL included)

    I'm a fairly crappy boomkin, I would say, or at least that's what it feels like at times. It's my OS that I play when we need to 2 heal a fight. However, given I run a 10m, it's critical my DPS is where it needs to be.

    As it stands, I do hurt myself by having a lot of pieces that are gemmed for healing by some degree, though I do respec for boomkin. However, I'm sure there are things outside of this that are holding me back.

    Here is my latest Garalon kill. Note, I do pheromone kiting on this fight so my DPS does get hurt for 1/4 of it, but even then I feel like I'm getting held back: http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/r...?s=9113&e=9530
    Last edited by Mehdi; 2012-11-19 at 05:50 AM.

  2. #2
    You should work harder on damaging the legs while standing in their circles, that's what you're failing at compared to your other dps in the raid.


    Your spriest had ~48% weak point up time (standing in the leg's circle), while you had ~20% weak point up time.
    Last edited by earthwormjim; 2012-11-19 at 12:23 PM.

  3. #3
    Wow, that's a very good observation - thank you! I'm sure a portion of that is a side effect of me having to doing pheromones, but certainly not enough to account for such a lower uptime. I'll certainly need to work on that.

    I'm assuming you play boomkin on this fight as well - what's your strategy on this fight? Do you dot up all the legs while you're on weakpoints? Focus the leg? etc... I've only had 3-4 pulls on this fight as boom, having been resto up till now

  4. #4
    - Uptime on ur dots is low (80% only)

    - It looks like your starting rotation is messed up (unless I'm seeying this wrong): it looks like you'r not using CA properly with Incarnation. It looks like you go lunar, pop incarnation+NV, wrath all the way till solar and then use CA? That's messed up. You should go lunar, inc+nv, *as you are exiting lunar* pop CA (that's because incarnation only works while in an eclipse, thus u use CA and the end of lunar to extend that eclipse till INC runs out).

    - Looks like you delayed to pop Incarnation on pull (u wasted 1/2 of hero and 1/2 of ur potion probably while walking/positioning). Not sure if u were waiting for tank to get aggro or if u were just kinda away from boss and moving to get in range (speed boots like savage roar help here).

    - You tranq'd (which lowers your dps)

    And finally a question: what are you casting while kiting boss with debuff? i.e. are you spamming dots, are you trying to squeeze a cast in between, etc... lets review that too.

  5. #5
    Quote Originally Posted by land View Post
    - Uptime on ur dots is low (80% only)

    >>> Very true... I'll have to see why that is.

    - It looks like your starting rotation is messed up (unless I'm seeying this wrong): it looks like you'r not using CA properly with Incarnation. It looks like you go lunar, pop incarnation+NV, wrath all the way till solar and then use CA? That's messed up. You should go lunar, inc+nv, *as you are exiting lunar* pop CA (that's because incarnation only works while in an eclipse, thus u use CA and the end of lunar to extend that eclipse till INC runs out).

    >>> It absolutely is - that particular pull I got caught off guard with the pull, which is why the starting rotation is off. Being a noob, unless I AC to 1 wrath prior to lunar, my rotation gets a bit hosed since I admittidly freak. That said, I didn't realize how well Inc/CA were tied together... thanks for pointing that out! Up until now, I've been using CA after I went into Solar, to "boost" me faster to lunar... not sure why I thought that was a good idea. I'll definitely need to fix this.

    - Looks like you delayed to pop Incarnation on pull (u wasted 1/2 of hero and 1/2 of ur potion probably while walking/positioning). Not sure if u were waiting for tank to get aggro or if u were just kinda away from boss and moving to get in range (speed boots like savage roar help here).
    >>> Using speed seems like a good idea. In addition to my previous comment, I actually MF spam until I am in the Weak Points. Then I try to continue my rotation until and if I get to another Weak Points circle... spamming MF/SF as I get there.
    >>> Do you think it's better to wait until after hero/lust is complete, before bothering with Weak Points? I'm thinking, that perhaps I should instead wrath, pop Inc+NV, and dot up the legs/body as I get to a Weak Point, then start the regular rotation.

    - You tranq'd (which lowers your dps)
    >>> true, I can't help it though on those oh shit moments since we're 2 healing

    And finally a question: what are you casting while kiting boss with debuff? i.e. are you spamming dots, are you trying to squeeze a cast in between, etc... lets review that too.
    Good stuff.

    Answers in-line. The answer to your last question though - I ended up spamming dots, as I found that trying to squeeze in a case in between got me hit by a tick. Though, I still think I missed a few GCDs still trying to experiment what worked and what didn't. Though... I should have just wowhead'ed... with a 2s puddle spawn and a 2s wrath/sf cast time, it seems dot spamming was the surefire way to go.

    Thank you!
    Last edited by Mehdi; 2012-11-19 at 07:33 PM.

  6. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by Mehdi View Post
    Good stuff.

    Answers in-line. The answer to your last question though - I ended up spamming dots, as I found that trying to squeeze in a case in between got me hit by a tick. Though, I still think I missed a few GCDs still trying to experiment what worked and what didn't. Though... I should have just wowhead'ed... with a 2s puddle spawn and a 2s wrath/sf cast time, it seems dot spamming was the surefire way to go.

    Thank you!
    Our group actually assigned groups of two dps to each leg at the start of the fight, so that there is less running around and more focus on everyone getting the damage boost during the Bloodlust. Basically what I did for the opener was, starfall, wrath to eclipse, pop Inc and dot up garalon and other legs while running into my dps leg's circle, from there picking up my normal opening rotation. Something you can do to really make dotting easier for this fight is do a focus target macro for both your dots and focus Garalon's body before the fight. That way, no matter what you are doing with the legs you can easily keep your dots rolling on the body at all times. If you are one of the kiters, make sure your kiting turn doesn't fall in your opening burst phase, as you'll lose more dps to that than most other classes would.

    I actually have a question for some boomkins who have done the kiting though. We had 5 range for our kill this week, so I was relieved of kiting responsibilities, I am wondering what the best strat for boomkins is while you're doing the kiting as I won't be so lucky next week.

  7. #7
    When I do the kiting I get a cast of wrath/starfire of in between each puddle. Of course if I need to I refresh my dots. So I just do my normal rotation. But since you are running a lot while kiting one set of dots wont do it from one eclipse to the other. So make sure you refresh them while in eclipse and have NG.

    Try and finish your eclipse/or do not proc it right before starting to kite so you don't waste NG uptime. Also try and move(during dot refreshing etc) to your switching position beforehand so you don't have to run as far when its your turn.

    Also in my raid i'm not assigned to cleaving. So I just keep on nuking the boss and leave the cleaving to the cleavers.

    If you want to know anything else just ask.

  8. #8
    Quote Originally Posted by Mehdi View Post
    >>> Do you think it's better to wait until after hero/lust is complete, before bothering with Weak Points? I'm thinking, that perhaps I should instead wrath, pop Inc+NV, and dot up the legs/body as I get to a Weak Point, then start the regular rotation.!
    Movement kills our dps unless properly done (i.e. between globals, i.e. when casting dots or starfall). On pull, I wouldn't bother trying to move legs unless you pre-pop druid speed and get that done while casting ur dots on pull. But this is not ur main spec, i'd say it would confuse you more than anything. I'd prob just get in range and work on the normal opener with the exception of dotting up one set of legs - besides the body). U want to maximize ur uptime on hero/pot/inc/nv/etc without a lot of movement.

    Also, read somewhere about trying to move all the time to get the legs buff just kills our dps and its not worth it if you have to be moving all the time. Some ppl are saying just have ur melee on legs and make range just dot legs up but stay on boss, minimizing movement and letting legs for classes that can cleave it (rogues/warrs).

    ---------- Post added 2012-11-19 at 05:19 PM ----------

    Quote Originally Posted by ganush View Post
    I actually have a question for some boomkins who have done the kiting though. We had 5 range for our kill this week, so I was relieved of kiting responsibilities, I am wondering what the best strat for boomkins is while you're doing the kiting as I won't be so lucky next week.
    I noticed that some of our kiters are actually hardcasting thus usually taking 1 tick of damage from puddle and that doesn't' seem to be much of a problem to heal until the stacks gets high (15+). I'd try that, maybe link with a DK for AMS (instead of a mage for MI, which is completely useless) and chain AMS with Barkskin around 10+ stacks and when hitting 15 start just spamming the eclipsed dot. It would take some practice to time the defensives chaining (i.e. pop at 8, or maybe at 12, etc) and try to time that as well with being in a solar eclipse around 15 so you have a strong dot to spam...
    Last edited by land; 2012-11-19 at 10:20 PM.

  9. #9
    Quote Originally Posted by land View Post
    Movement kills our dps unless properly done (i.e. between globals, i.e. when casting dots or starfall). On pull, I wouldn't bother trying to move legs unless you pre-pop druid speed and get that done while casting ur dots on pull. But this is not ur main spec, i'd say it would confuse you more than anything. I'd prob just get in range and work on the normal opener with the exception of dotting up one set of legs - besides the body). U want to maximize ur uptime on hero/pot/inc/nv/etc without a lot of movement.

    Also, read somewhere about trying to move all the time to get the legs buff just kills our dps and its not worth it if you have to be moving all the time. Some ppl are saying just have ur melee on legs and make range just dot legs up but stay on boss, minimizing movement and letting legs for classes that can cleave it (rogues/warrs).

    ---------- Post added 2012-11-19 at 05:19 PM ----------



    I noticed that some of our kiters are actually hardcasting thus usually taking 1 tick of damage from puddle and that doesn't' seem to be much of a problem to heal until the stacks gets high (15+). I'd try that, maybe link with a DK for AMS (instead of a mage for MI, which is completely useless) and chain AMS with Barkskin around 10+ stacks and when hitting 15 start just spamming the eclipsed dot. It would take some practice to time the defensives chaining (i.e. pop at 8, or maybe at 12, etc) and try to time that as well with being in a solar eclipse around 15 so you have a strong dot to spam...
    They fixed the cleave bug, so cleavers aren't doing 400% dps like they were, it's worth having everyone in your raid in the circles. I really can't see missing out on 100% increased damage just so you don't have to move being worthwhile either. You would have to be casting worse than half (factoring in DOTs) as often to realize a loss in DPS.

    You can time your movements with your instant casts, and position yourself to be at the very front of the circles, minimizing how often you actually have to move. If your group is doing the fight correctly, Garalon doesn't move very fast.
    Last edited by earthwormjim; 2012-11-20 at 12:57 AM.

  10. #10
    Quote Originally Posted by land View Post
    Movement kills our dps unless properly done (i.e. between globals, i.e. when casting dots or starfall). On pull, I wouldn't bother trying to move legs unless you pre-pop druid speed and get that done while casting ur dots on pull. But this is not ur main spec, i'd say it would confuse you more than anything. I'd prob just get in range and work on the normal opener with the exception of dotting up one set of legs - besides the body). U want to maximize ur uptime on hero/pot/inc/nv/etc without a lot of movement.

    Also, read somewhere about trying to move all the time to get the legs buff just kills our dps and its not worth it if you have to be moving all the time. Some ppl are saying just have ur melee on legs and make range just dot legs up but stay on boss, minimizing movement and letting legs for classes that can cleave it (rogues/warrs).

    ---------- Post added 2012-11-19 at 05:19 PM ----------



    I noticed that some of our kiters are actually hardcasting thus usually taking 1 tick of damage from puddle and that doesn't' seem to be much of a problem to heal until the stacks gets high (15+). I'd try that, maybe link with a DK for AMS (instead of a mage for MI, which is completely useless) and chain AMS with Barkskin around 10+ stacks and when hitting 15 start just spamming the eclipsed dot. It would take some practice to time the defensives chaining (i.e. pop at 8, or maybe at 12, etc) and try to time that as well with being in a solar eclipse around 15 so you have a strong dot to spam...
    I was thinking wraths would be possible to get off, but starfire seems a little cumbersome. We only run two healers for the fight, so taking ticks may be putting a little extra strain on them, I will take a look at the logs to see how much damage our kiters may have been taking from the pools. As for symbiosis, alas we don't have a DK, but I do link to a warlock for most fights for the damage reduction. On further review, we probably won't get to this fight til Sunday due to U.S. Thanksgiving costing us a few regular raiders, and we should have the extra range available on Sunday, so I may escape kiting duties again =).

  11. #11
    My parse from Garalon last night, a bit better... but still not where I want to be.

    http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/r...?s=3122&e=3533

    I do need to practice, namely in respect to dealing with heavy movement during pheramones to transitioning back to focusing on DPS.
    Last edited by Mehdi; 2012-11-21 at 08:22 PM.

  12. #12
    Quote Originally Posted by earthwormjim View Post
    They fixed the cleave bug, so cleavers aren't doing 400% dps like they were, it's worth having everyone in your raid in the circles. I really can't see missing out on 100% increased damage just so you don't have to move being worthwhile either. You would have to be casting worse than half (factoring in DOTs) as often to realize a loss in DPS.

    You can time your movements with your instant casts, and position yourself to be at the very front of the circles, minimizing how often you actually have to move. If your group is doing the fight correctly, Garalon doesn't move very fast.
    It's still a raid damage loss for you to be standing in circles if you're not a cleaver unless there are 3+ legs up at once. Mend leg is on a timer and while you're attacking the leg in a circle, unlike natural cleavers, you are not doing any damage to the boss.

  13. #13
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    Quote Originally Posted by Sepe View Post
    It's still a raid damage loss for you to be standing in circles if you're not a cleaver unless there are 3+ legs up at once. Mend leg is on a timer and while you're attacking the leg in a circle, unlike natural cleavers, you are not doing any damage to the boss.
    I agree. Haven't done 10 man so maybe it's tuned different, and it'll obviously depend on your raid comp -- but the circles are a ruse. You spend more time running to them to do damage then you would do just damaging the leg then immediately the boss.

    On 25man, we let our melee cleave them, and then DoT-DPS keeps dots up. If a leg spawns that's "on" the melee, they'll turn and nuke it real fast.
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  14. #14
    That's some good advice, I'll have to give that a go next week. Do you still dot the legs up, then continue on the boss? or just stick on the boss the entire time? What about at the start of the fight - where lust/nv/in is up

  15. #15
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mehdi View Post
    That's some good advice, I'll have to give that a go next week. Do you still dot the legs up, then continue on the boss? or just stick on the boss the entire time? What about at the start of the fight - where lust/nv/in is up
    I generally will dot legs at the top of each eclipse if they are in range.
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  16. #16
    Quote Originally Posted by Mehdi View Post
    That's some good advice, I'll have to give that a go next week. Do you still dot the legs up, then continue on the boss? or just stick on the boss the entire time? What about at the start of the fight - where lust/nv/in is up
    I'm running with a 10 man and I use Inc/NV at pull and stand in one of the circles and DoT all legs and we kill off all legs asap and then go boss.
    After that I just keep DoTs up on boss and focus legs when they're up, and step into circle's if they are near you, don't run around like a crazy chicken to chase the circles.

  17. #17
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    I was under the impression that you only got the increased damage from the circles for THAT leg. The damage increase doesn't carry over to the other legs unless you are A. cleaving B. standing in that leg's circle.

  18. #18
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    Quote Originally Posted by silentkillin View Post
    I was under the impression that you only got the increased damage from the circles for THAT leg. The damage increase doesn't carry over to the other legs unless you are A. cleaving B. standing in that leg's circle.
    That's correct. You're still doing straight damage to the boss if you have dots on the legs, even without being in the circle, since each leg is exactly 3% of garalon's health and they take away 3% when they die.. the circles are more of a ruse imo, at least in 25man.
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  19. #19
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    Oh I agree. I spend most of my time outside the legs even on 10m. We have a rogue and frost dk that do a lot of cleaving on the legs. When they come up though I generally dot them as best as I can and push hard on the body. The legs dont generally stay up very long with the rogue and dk on them.

  20. #20
    As long as the legs are dying before the next one spawns, any extra dps on them, including random dots is going to translate into a dps loss for the fight (provided you have cleaving classes). If your cleavers can keep the legs down without help then leave it to them and single target the boss. Our 10 man is short on cleaving classes, so we do dot up the legs because we have to, but if you have two cleaving melee dps, it'll be better for your range to just ignore the legs.

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