Windwalkers - State of DPS 5.4

[George Costanza]

https://twitter.com/devolore/status/370240054897025025

[Frogged]

While combo breaker was a logistical mess in 5.0, I do miss the overall feel of the spec back then.

The nice part is that right now, 5.4's PTR Windwalker feels a lot like 5.0's Windwalker without the mess and worthless Mastery.

well that's the thing, we're able to do really strong (possibly too strong) damage with Windwalker on PTR ... Single target. We're just doing something very differently that the community hasn't figured out yet, it seems.

This is exactly why I've been talking a lot during this thread. The Windwalker community is both ignorant of the fact that their class is really quite good, and also off-track because prominent Windwalkers are guiding them that way. If you approach the class with logic and an open mind on your own, you can see that the class is in a spot that's probably too good. Even in PTR. There's too much muddying of the waters with SimCraft spitting out bad numbers and everyone getting focused on small things (for 25ers) like a utility spell.

(Evidence below this post.)

Thank the laws of physics for the patch delay.

Yep! Now we'll have plenty of time to provide feedback we feel is necessary. I'm quite glad about that.

This mastery scales terribly and it's incredibly dull. I expected more creativity out of blizzard.

Most classes have a dull Mastery. It's kind of the intent, as they're meant as a tuning stat, among other things.

As someone mentioned in another post. If we were doing top damage right now with the exact same mechanics, no one would be here complaining.

If you think no one would complain while at the top, I invite you to go browse the Mage forums. Or our forums, since Windwalkers are competitive for the top in almost every situation. People want something to complain about, whether it exists or not.

[Deleted]

https://twitter.com/devolore/status/370240054897025025

Haha, yes yes... too strong? not figured out? do the Devs think we are retards?

"Our testing"? because it worked soooo good in 5.2

[Adornus]

Haha, yes yes... too strong? not figured out? do the Devs think we are retards?

"Our testing"? because it worked soooo good in 5.2

That was me (@Ruefasa). I was dumbfounded getting those responses. The only thing I can think of is that they're incorrectly testing like they did 5.2 and Chi Wave. How can we trust their testing when they've proven that they incorrectly test in the past (multiple times)?

I put a record of our entire conversation here.

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/to...530?page=9#174

[Frogged]

Haha, yes yes... too strong? not figured out? do the Devs think we are retards?

That was me (@Ruefasa). *I was dumbfounded getting those responses. *The only thing I can think of is that they're incorrectly testing like they did 5.2 and Chi Wave.

Have you considered that you haven't yet reached the skill level where you're getting the most out of the class? Human error is an option. Lots of people find Windwalker to be competitive, and perhaps even too strong. Again, even on PTR.

You can't take your personal experiences and relate them to everyone who plays the class. Especially when plenty of other people are finding contradictory results.

[Buju]

lol @ Lore...

Also, anyone have a BiS list for t16 handy?

[Adornus]

Have you considered that you haven't yet reached the skill level where you're getting the most out of the class? Human error is an option. Lots of people find Windwalker to be competitive, and perhaps even too strong. Again, even on PTR.

That's a pretty insulting post, and yes I'm fairly certain I know what I'm doing. And if you don't want to believe me, I'm more than willing to provide the armory for the guy I tested with who has multiple West top 10 parses for 25H for WW (he's saying the same thing). Do you want me to provide your skillness with logs to show I'm not a mouthbreather? I know you're a good player (because I know who you are), but even you have to be seeing nerfs on the PTR if you've actually tested.

Please tell me this secret formula that none of us know.

- - - Updated - - -

You can't take your personal experiences and relate them to everyone who plays the class. Especially when plenty of other people are finding contradictory results.

Who is finding contradictory results? WHO? Name one person and provide proof that they are indeed seeing buffs. If you compare RoR + current BIS with the same gearset on 5.4 PTR, it is a massive nerf.

[Frogged]

It's not insulting to bring up the fact that someone could be playing wrong. That's what got us in this whole position of denial and depression in the Windwalker community. Nowhere did I claim that you were a mouthbreather. You're acting like it's not human to make mistakes. It doesn't make people less of a person or a "mouthbreather," it just means they need to reapproach the situation. As for a secret formula: I have none, but I've been giving players tips for months and having it ignored. Feel free to browse around my post history.

As for who is finding contradictory results, I'll start with the easiest. Me. During my PTR testing I was doing upwards of 150% of the damage output of the second person on the damage lists in my logs. I'll see if I can get a hold of them to post up here. They were Ferals, Warriors, Ele Shamans, and a few others I can't remember. Additionally, why are you comparing with a live gearset? That seems incredibly short-sighted. That's not the gear we'll be using during SoO, especially not Rune.

[Adornus]

It's not insulting to bring up the fact that someone could be playing wrong. That's what got us in this whole position of denial and depression in the Windwalker community. Nowhere did I claim that you were a mouthbreather. You're acting like it's not human to make mistakes. It doesn't make people less of a person or a "mouthbreather," it just means they need to reapproach the situation. As for a secret formula: I have none, but I've been giving players tips for months and having it ignored. Feel free to browse around my post history.

Have you tested the PTR? What numbers have you been experiencing in comparing live with the PTR? Not trying to be a dick, I'm curious, because in any testing that I've done, and friends, it has been a pretty significant nerf. Our only saving grace is AoE fights.

- - - Updated - - -

As for who is finding contradictory results, I'll start with the easiest. Me. During my PTR testing I was doing upwards of 150% of the damage output of the second person on the damage lists in my logs. I'll see if I can get a hold of them to post up here. They were Ferals, Warriors, Ele Shamans, and a few others I can't remember. Additionally, why are you comparing with a live gearset? That seems incredibly short-sighted. That's not the gear we'll be using during SoO, especially not Rune.

Of course it's not... but when you compare your 5.3 live results, to results the minute 5.4 goes live, to T16 4pc, and you see a 20% decrease on the first and barely even on the second (with +10 ilvls), doesn't that seem wrong to you? You shouldn't have to gain that amount of gear just to get back to where you were.

- - - Updated - - -

As for who is finding contradictory results, I'll start with the easiest. Me. During my PTR testing I was doing upwards of 150% of the damage output of the second person on the damage lists in my logs. I'll see if I can get a hold of them to post up here. They were Ferals, Warriors, Ele Shamans, and a few others I can't remember. Additionally, why are you comparing with a live gearset? That seems incredibly short-sighted. That's not the gear we'll be using during SoO, especially not Rune.

Of course it's not... but when you compare your 5.3 live results, to results the minute 5.4 goes live, to T16 4pc, and you see a 20% decrease on the first and barely even on the second (with +10 ilvls), doesn't that seem wrong to you? You shouldn't have to gain that amount of gear just to get back to where you were, especially with the amount of scaling every other class gets in that time.

Were your logs on single target? I'm very curious to see your spell selection/usage.

[Frogged]

Of course it's not... but when you compare your 5.3 live results, to results the minute 5.4 goes live, to T16 4pc, and you see a 20% decrease on the first and barely even on the second (with +10 ilvls), doesn't that seem wrong to you? You shouldn't have to gain that amount of gear just to get back to where you were, especially with the amount of scaling every other class gets in that time.

I think that there is a distinct possibility that we can see a nerf of ~5% and be below Live numbers while still ahead of most other classes. Not to mention that we'll be scaling with our weapons much better than most classes will during the tier, so by the end we'll see a comparative increase. I do agree that I've been seeing lower numbers than on Live, but keep in mind that we're already pretty well ahead during 5.3, and other classes are receiving their own nerfs. Most notably Enhancement Shamans and Fire Mages.

It's worth looking at things in the big picture, rather than copying your character over, using the same gear, and determining a 20% damage loss while claiming Windwalkers won't do good damage. Other classes receive nerfs as well, our set bonuses and trinkets obtained in the tier can potentially play a major part in our scaling throughout the tier, as well as every other factor that's worth considering.

Take, for instance, Assassination Rogues in 5.2. I don't know about everyone else's personal experiences, but here are my own anecdotal ones: On patch day, Assassination Rogues were 10-15% ahead of every other spec in the game, with little or no effort. We constantly joked about it being absurd that it was even taking place. Fast forward about 20 weeks, and the thought suddenly occurred to me that I hadn't seen Assassination Rogues on top of the meters in a very, very long time. Sometimes, I don't see them within the top half.

Now, obviously, other people may have different experiences. I like to think that, for the most part, my guild's DPS are pretty skilled, especially the Rogues. We have one that's been playing a Rogue for longer than 5 years. I have confidence in their ability, and they certainly showed it during patch launch. But later on in the tier, their scaling fell behind while Monks skyrocketed (as we will in any situation involving scaling) and suddenly, everything changed. Imagine if Assassination Rogues had been balanced with other classes for Day 1 Copy no-gear-change damage. At this point they would be so far behind they might even be losing to tanks.

So, yes. I think we are losing some damage on patch launch. I also think lots of other classes are, that we'll still be fine on Day 1, and that we'll scale well past our initial 5.4 place within the great DPS jigsaw puzzle. It's a good thing that Blizzard thinks they have us overtuned. That means they're willing to let us be overtuned, and if we aren't, there's a good chance they will see to it so that we are.

[Jayma]

Not sure how 150% more damage than random players is relevant to anything. No context of fight mechanics or whether you playing with actual competent people.

We are simply comparing single target from live to single target PTR.

Does better stat allocation, slightly higher TeB uptime, and improved xuen make up for 67-193+ TeB's with RoRo.
Is there any possible ~545 Ilvl combination that will produce ~250k ST results?

[Adornus]

So, yes. I think we are losing some damage on patch launch. I also think lots of other classes are, that we'll still be fine on Day 1, and that we'll scale well past our initial 5.4 place within the great DPS jigsaw puzzle.

Do you think you could possibly be underestimating the initial loss, and overestimating the scaling of gear?

Our major scaling stat has been changed to not really scale at all, we get no added benefit from crit (also scales poorly), and we're nearing haste caps. The only thing that scales well is weapon damage.

[Grimkeg]

Here's two logs from the 25 men nonheroic testing this week. First log is Immerseus (520 ilvl scaling). Second is Blackfuse (540ilvl scaling). All testing done with legendary cloak on every raidmember. All melees could focus on the boss, conveyer belt (or whatever it's called) was done by range dd's.

http://imgur.com/a/Tt3oh#gBnlUcm
Actual dps was extremely close to the >dps< numbers, not the dps(e) (much lower because i didn't chose the exact time frame for pull/end).
Blackfuse is an excellent example. 245k dps (skada, exactly as he died) with 540 ilvl.
Both bosses played with Xuen of course. Used Chi Brew on both. We also destroy most classes (those darned elemental shamans ) on spoils (using cleave trinket + rjw).
Reforging was exp/hit cap > haste > crit, but very poorly done because of the always changing scaling. Full guild group (see signature).

[Totaltotemic]

I don't get it, nothing is changing in the single-target world for WW except TEB, and we already know what the numbers on that are like, it's lower than live (with RoRo).

The only possible candidates for something that revolutionizes the way WW works are:

Rushing Jade Wind - Has anyone thought about what the value of 240% of an SCK for 40 energy would do to single-target DPS? It doesn't generate chi, but maybe I'm missing something here and it secretly does so much damage that it makes up for that?

Stat priority - Suppose we did something different. What if we ignored Fists of Fury and stacked haste further, stopped using Chi Wave in single-target damage, and just non-stop spammed Jab/RSK/BoK with one TP every 30 seconds? Mastery and haste scale with each other, and with no RoRo gating TEB usage, this is something we thought about pre-5.2 until RoRo was discovered and gave up on it. This could provide radically different results, but I just don't have the bandwidth this week to crunch all that out or make sure the sim is working properly enough to do this with.


If it's not one of those two things, then something must be wrong on their end. Our basic priority (keep TP up, RSK on CD, Jab when capping energy as long as chi is available and dump with BoK) is not changing in the slightest. Only our stats and one talent are major changes this patch, if it's not one of those then DPS can't possibly be radically better than live.

[Frogged]

Do you think you could possibly be underestimating the initial loss, and overestimating the scaling of gear?

Yes, absolutely. I have no delusions that I know what will end up being true or not. Only what I think is most probable.

Not sure how 150% more damage than random players is relevant to anything. No context of fight mechanics or whether you playing with actual competent people.

They were all guildies that usually keep up with me during Live raids. They could have been having PTR issues, though, certainly. Nor am I claiming that Windwalkers will be that far ahead on Live, only that I saw it happening repeatedly, which, to me, means that Windwalker does have a tiny bit of room to fall before they're in trouble. I think it's also worth pointing out that I did not have the legendary cloak during this PTR testing, and a number of raid members did, but that it was also before the recent 4pc nerf and TEB change. Edit: The fight it was most noticeable was Malkorok where, at least for melee, it's fairly patchwerk.

Here's two logs from the 25 men nonheroic testing this week.

Thanks for the logs! Those are very interesting. As I thought, the damage from Windwalker looks fairly competitive. And that's before scaling kicks in.

Stat priority - Suppose we did something different. What if we ignored Fists of Fury and stacked haste further, stopped using Chi Wave in single-target damage, and just non-stop spammed Jab/RSK/BoK with one TP every 30 seconds? Mastery and haste scale with each other, and with no RoRo gating TEB usage, this is something we thought about pre-5.2 until RoRo was discovered and gave up on it. This could provide radically different results, but I just don't have the bandwidth this week to crunch all that out or make sure the sim is working properly enough to do this with.

This is exactly what I did in 5.2 before I got Rune, albeit with 5.2's Mastery. I despise Crit on Windwalker as it scales with nothing while giving us no benefit outside meager bonus damage. On the other hand, even on PTR Mastery and Haste scale with each other. Haste and Mastery being set to equal values in 5.2 pre-Rune was giving me insanely good numbers, and I got quite a few top 5 parses on WoL with it. I was running ~8k of each or something like that.

I've been talking about the false value of Crit proposed on these forums since Mists launched. Crit is awful and will always be awful. The only reason you would want Crit over another stat is if the second stat was awful-er, like 5.0 Mastery. I would fully recommend trying what you stated here. It may turn out to be wrong (new mastery and all), but it's certainly worth looking into. In game.

[Professor Hurt]

For those who keep bringing up the comparison of live DPS to PTR DPS, let's go through a couple scenarios:

Scenario 1: WW are the only class changing on the PTR
Feedback: The community could usefully compare live DPS to PTR DPS for feedback because the other variables in the comparison (all other class DPS) remains the same.

Scenario 2: Every class is changing on the PTR
Feedback: The community can't usefully compare live DPS to PTR DPS for feedback because every variable in the comparison is changing. Perhaps Windwalkers are getting a 5% nerf but every other class is getting a 10% nerf.

Scenario 3: Every class plus several DPS-related mechanics (RPPM anyone?) are changing on the PTR
Feedback: Same as Scenario 2, but this makes it even harder to compare A to B without a lot of real world testing. Trusting simulations is even questionable as most probably contain bugs that haven't been ironed out yet. On top of that, some classes are still being tweaked, so most comparisons are moving targets.

The reality is that Scenario 3 is what's happening, so comparing our DPS from live to PTR provides little to no useful information. If we want to provide useful feedback to Blizzard (and within our community), we really have to focus on how our rotation feels and how we stack up to other PTR classes (not live!).

[Frogged]

The reality is that Scenario 3 is what's happening, so comparing our DPS from live to PTR provides little to no useful information. If we want to provide useful feedback to Blizzard (and within our community), we really have to focus on how our rotation feels and how we stack up to other PTR classes (not live!).

I love you for posting this! Couldn't have said it better myself. Luckily a lot of people are starting to move that direction. 5.4 looks like it has a lot of potential to be pretty fun for our spec both in the game and on the forums.

[TheWindWalker]

I've been talking about the false value of Crit proposed on these forums since Mists launched. Crit is awful and will always be awful. The only reason you would want Crit over another stat is if the second stat was awful-er, like 5.0 Mastery. I would fully recommend trying what you stated here. It may turn out to be wrong (new mastery and all), but it's certainly worth looking into. In game.

Could someone give me an explanation as to why Haste is any better in any situation? I figured once you reached the barrier of "If I go any further, I might as well take Energizing Brew off my bar, again" point, you stopped because any more than that and it's just a basic damage scaling stat like crit is. Except crit effects everything while haste only effects autoattack speed and energy regeneration.

[Saltycracker]

Everyone in this thread who is waving your hands and saying "My numbers are higher" or "My numbers are lower" needs to bring some data to back up this claim. Combat logging exists for a reason. Learn from eachother, and stop the epeen measuring.

If a Blizzard developer says that monks are playing their rotation incorrectly, then either they are wrong or the WW community is collectively wrong. My guess it's probably some of both.

http://elitistjerks.com/f99/t131848-...5/#post2326989

I'd encourage everyone to read this post to get some perspective and relative value of where our numbers are on live and PTR. Go run similar tests and get off the forums.

Re: Crit

The incremental value of crit is greater than the incremental value of mastery in almost every case I have looked at from a pure performance perspective (1.50 DPS/rating vs. 2.62 DPS/point roughly). The tactical value of mastery might be higher if you can optimize your TEB usage during critical points during the encounter.

I stacked crit in 5.0/5.1 because haste and mastery were constantly fighting each other, and as long as I could maintain a fluid rotation stacking more of either of them wasn’t needed. Crit was the lesser of three evils in that case.

I’m grateful it doesn’t do anything extra or awesome. Not only do we get crit from Agi but from rating as well, and if something crazy happened when we crit, it would be a nightmare to balance from beginning of the expansion to the end. Crit would be always the answer, and we would need to be rebalanced every tier around it, and not some other mechanic.

[Frogged]

There is an area of discussion where ideas can be expressed before they're checked mathematically. That's whats happening here. I heavily encourage anyone who does have an idea to check it on PTR before live, but to suggest that no one can discuss without immediate logs to back them up is exclusionary and ridiculous. No one is saying their ideas are backed up by math (until they do so). I agree that there has been a lot of unnecessary discussion about damage numbers that don't involve logs, and that's something that should be kept to a minimum for sure. However, there does need to be an area where ideas can be discussed before they are tested. That's completely necessary.

That's disregarding the fact that logging correctly is extraordinarily time-consuming, and if every point of discussion were forced to be backed up by one, we'd be getting nowhere. Keep in mind that it's within everyone's rights to completely ignore anyone if they so choose. If you feel that someone (including myself) is making false claims with no proof to back it up, feel free to read past. That's the beauty of a discussion forum. Everyone gets to talk about their ideas.

TL;DR Yes, claiming math with no proof is dumb. Discussing ideas without math is fine, especially if at some point in the future, testing is done.

The incremental value of crit is greater than the incremental value of mastery in almost every case I have looked at from a pure performance perspective (1.50 DPS/rating vs. 2.62 DPS/point roughly).

That's good to know. Things seemed up in the air with all the TEB changes on PTR. I did see pretty good performance with Hastecap > Crit > Mastery in my testing, but that was before Mastery was changed. I do fully intend to revisit my Crit/Mastery testing on the 8th or 9th. And yes, one of the nice parts about Crit is that it is purely passive, so if you can find a reason to gain more Crit, you don't have to worry about it changing your skill usage.

One of the reasons I've always tried to avoid Crit (in 5.0 I was Haste > Crit > Mastery) is something I don't believe I've stated yet. Crit's value shows diminishing returns as you get more, which is especially influenced by our absurdly high base Crit chance from Agility scaling. As such, Crit will only ever scale downward comparatively with other stats. On the other hand, Haste (up to hard cap) and Mastery can be stacked quite heavily. Mastery also plays off Haste. More Chi spent = More TEB gained = More TEB procs. As such these two stats (up to Haste hard cap) see a positive gain as you get more (even passively by increasing average ilevel).

What this means, to me, is that for Crit to be valuable it needs to outpace Mastery even in later scaling stages, while considering Mastery's positive scaling and Crit's negative scaling. This may very well be the case. It's just not fun to stack a stat that scales with nothing, shows diminishing returns, and doesn't affect our skill usage at all. I saw very, very good numbers in T14 putting Crit well behind Haste, which also leads me to believe that gap will increase as average ilevel increases as well.

But again, I want to reiterate: I don't currently think Mastery is ahead of Crit on PTR. I intend to run Hastecap > Crit > Mastery until I experience otherwise through testing.