Brewmaster and weapons

[Deleted]

Hey guys!

I know the general rule of thumb, is go with the higher item level, but i appear to have a slight dilema. My guild has just started officially raiding, and sooner or later, i know im going to get either a 489 fist from gara'jal, or the polearm from spirit kings.

The issue i have, is i have the sha touched staff, and tonight i got my 500 agility gem. Would the 483 staff with a 500 gem still be better than the 489 polearm from spirit kings, or should i hold of on the gem till i get the normal mode staff, even though that could take quite a while?

Any help is greatly appreciated!

[Alucin]

I'd also like to hijack this thread with further questions.
I should be in the position shortly of the guild downing shek'zeer and tsulong. people seem to be wanting the dual wield with gara'kal.

Given the ilvl, is there much difference?
does it come down to dual enchants? Or is it just that gua-rei or whatever the name is has too much mastery?

Same boat that it comes down to that gem, and I might be in a position of having to decide soon.
(i want to justify the staff-i think that's what a monk visually should use, but I don't want to make a gimping decision)

[Nikkaszal]

Yep, keep your Tsulong stick.

Upgrade that with normal Shek'zeer claw gemmed + another fist, or normal Gao staff.

It basically goes like this:
LFR
Normal
LFR Sha-touched
Heroic
Normal Sha-touched
Heroic Sha-touched

[Valkari]

Yep, keep your Tsulong stick.

Upgrade that with normal Shek'zeer claw gemmed + another fist, or normal Gao staff.

It basically goes like this:
LFR
Normal
LFR Sha-touched
Heroic
Normal Sha-touched
Heroic Sha-touched

That's pretty much what I've been going with, working pretty well so far. The staff with the gem is a good 400 extra agility over the normal polearm, though the lack of haste before reforging is somewhat annoying.

[Kisho]

Just to throw in the reasoning as to why LFR sha-touched with gem is better:

Weapon damage doesn't really increase our personal mitigation. It may indirectly increase the shields we put on the raid with our ox statue, but it doesn't help us personally. Agility however, helps a ton, so the 500 agi gem is a significant boost that 6 ilevels of weapon damage can't really beat.

You can also buy more gems for 10,000 gold each, so assuming gold isn't an issue (or your guild is able to help out) then just use the gem and buy new ones as/when needed.

[siccora]

And now the final question. 2 sha touched fists or the sha touched staff?

[Tatuin]

the fist weps are better

[Nikkaszal]

Depends on how you like your EB stacks generated. 1Handers give you a steady stream of single stacks, 2Handers give you chunks.

That's pretty much it.

[Kisho]

Yeah, the fist weapons are much better itemised. That said a 2 hander has more stats than 2 1 handers (agi/stam), and the staff has mastery which is useful for smoothing out high bursts of physical damage. So you could use the staff in a stam/mastery set, for those times when it's useful.

But generally speaking, fist weapons are boss.

[SurrealNight]

And now the final question. 2 sha touched fists or the sha touched staff?

If your doing normal ToF and have a rogue in the group you may want to discuss weapons though. Since my group has one the best thing for the raid would be for rogue to get the fist(s) and I take Goa-Rei as the only agil staff user. Now if a 2nd fist drops before the staff I may have to have a discussion with him =) Exact same thing happened in MSV but I ended up getting the claws and staff anyways through coins....

Then it's a bit different story if you end up 1 LFR fist + X and get staff or something. Just depends on iLevel + Yes/No Gem + raid comp and what has dropped.

What can be considered another "advantage" is the staff will only mean 2x VP upgrades, my hatred of VP/daily farming may become greater than my love of DW.

As mentioned 2x fist are ideal if possible.

[Alucin]

So... (and I think I'll be in same position as you, surreal wrt rogue)


Assuming I reforge crit to haste on fists, mastery to haste on staff..
Gao rei is
+ 175agi
+ 263 stam
+ 4 haste
+ 280 exp
- 474 crit
+ 477 mastery.

Which I count as ahead on agi, as well as overall on secondary stats. I don't really have weights but i value exp over crit, with mastery less than half of crit. But at least even. So I'm guessing that the double enchant makes all the difference :\

However it's probably not so huge that compromising to the rogue would set me back too much?

Not sure when we'll get to tsulong though.

[Nikkaszal]

DPS having a better weapon is generally more important than tanks having better weapons. Although the point is rather fuzzy with Brewmasters since we do stupidly large amounts of damage and are pretty much an extra DPS if you play well XD

[gynshon]

Depends on how you like your EB stacks generated. 1Handers give you a steady stream of single stacks, 2Handers give you chunks.

That's pretty much it.

1h will always be better because there are times where you will drop the stacks with a 2h. It sucks when that happens. I try to pay attention to it and ensure the stacks aren't wasted if they are about to fall off.

[Nikkaszal]

1h will always be better because there are times where you will drop the stacks. It sucks when that happens. I try to pay attention to it and ensure the stacks aren't wasted if they are about to fall off.

That... makes zero sense. You don't need to wait for 15 stacks to use EB.

It's like saying "Shuffle has a habit of falling off if I don't keep using BoK, so Shuffle isn't that good".

[gynshon]

That... makes zero sense. You don't need to wait for 15 stacks to use EB.

It's like saying "Shuffle has a habit of falling off if I don't keep using BoK, so Shuffle isn't that good".

With a 2hander, I have seen 4 stacks of EB, and it will dwindle down in time and then fall off. 4 secs of EB is a joke but I will use it if I do not have a refresh of the stack. I have seen 3 stacks with the Spirit Kings polearm and fall off. It happens.

1h is always better because it is consistent and you can use it accordingly.

[Valkari]

With a 2hander, I have seen 4 stacks of EB, and it will dwindle down in time and then fall off. 4 secs of EB is a joke but I will use it if I do not have a refresh of the stack. I have seen 3 stacks with the Spirit Kings polearm and fall off. It happens.

1h is always better because it is consistent and you can use it accordingly.

That would depend on your crit chance, I suppose. Using a two hander, I've never had that issue, if anything I miss when the stacks go up and end up sitting at 15 for a bit.

[Tommi]

I've noticed that two fist weapons (using Gara'Kal heroic and Claw normal http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...rlena/advanced ) seems to work better than the staff. There is times i've used EB and have it come off CD to have 9 stacks sitting there waiting for me. It's insane

[SurrealNight]

With my current gearing and DW I have at least 4+ stacks when EB comes off CD which is great for certain fights. I can't imagine how stacks are dropping off during combat that seems impossible.

Sadly we have a rogue and no one to use the staff but me so I'm differing to him unless the Claw just keeps dropping every week....

[Alucin]

First kill last night and claw dropped. The rogue was very very excited lol.