[Balance] Pushing eclipses

[Nioso]

So I am struggling with pushing eclipses fast enough to keep NG active as much as possible. I have noticed if I split off to dot a few extra targets (2-3) with my eclipse empowered dot, I run out of NG well before I can get to the next eclipse. If I have to move for a second or two and use Displacer Beast, I get behind. What are some things I can be doing to speed that up? Should I be using Astral Communion if say I am not even out of the initial eclipse phase and my NG wears off? Should I still cast through the phase without NG?

At this point with being so geared, I wasn't expecting the Shooting Stars procs to come so slowly. I even track dots and try to make sure I am applying dots when NG and at least one other proc is up. My guildy balance druid says to dot more, but I don't see how that is going to help me if I am not getting SS procs and it puts me behind on my NG uptime. Does this mean like literally refresh dots on a target until I get an SS proc? I know I should be a lot closer to him, but I am still struggling to deliver solid numbers. I have picked up on pushing eclipses during down time to try and get as close to pre-lunar eclipse if possible, so that will be some thing I try to do from here on out.

Here is my character and logs just in case you want to look and spot some thing that might be an issue.
http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...stedt/advanced
http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/rt-7o8hkauyqynut96t/

[Justinsroy]

Looking at the set of logs vs your gear set you should realistically be doing quite a bit more damage, which is obviously why you are coming here (derp).

Looked at the IJ fight especially because it gives the best idea of a "patchwerk" fight where mechanics aren't forcing to run around 100% of the fight.

First giant red flag was the Starfire/Sunfire uptimes. Sitting around 61%/69% that is HORRIBLY LOW! your top ranked druid maintains a ~88% uptime on both, which firstly im curious why their is such a margin on the difference alone between YOUR 2 dots. And then your are a solid 20-30% lower on uptime of the most basic thing of playing boomkin which is keeping your dot's up, clipping at 1-2 seconds and refreshing (with at least NG, if you dont have other procs, i'd say re-apply anyway even though most of the fight i have multiple procs at all times) to keep them.
More dots lead to more SS procs, which leads to quicker transitions from each eclipse. Your gear level is close to mine and I routinely have ~5-6 seconds of NG left (Solar is tougher due to lower return per cast) when I hit the next eclipse.

This leads me to my next thing is that your Starsurge % is still 5% more damage then your next ability. Which with the low uptime of your dots, scares me. I understand that for heroic IJ depending on the strategy you use you may be in a corner during P2. Looked up Sha of Pride and your uptime %'s are BETTER (80-87%ish), but your damage is still lacking by a large margin compared to your gear score. Notable looking over my logs comparing my druids (including me) your starfire count on most fights just seems REALLY low, to the point where im personally casting double the # of starfires to you.

I'd suggest looking at your logs comparing where the damage is coming from with your druid, and then see what your doing. You can also check out the logs of my druids (LazerDroad/DittoDroad are balance) here: http://worldoflogs.com/guilds/22231/

Goodluck.

[Rawwrrkitty]

On a single target fight you should try to get as high of an uptime as you can of your dots. If you are 1-2 wrath casts or one starfire from next eclipse and dot's are falling off don't bother refreshing.

raidbot (dot) com/comparebot /52823f7574254ece010000cb#buffs (if someone could turn this into a working link)

Here is a single target scenario in which you had gotten 70 Shooting stars procs and casted 53 starsurges. High dot uptime will directly increase your shooting stars proc.
Your dot uptime was a bit low. Just something to practice. I find that most of the time after I enter an eclipse I have to check to see if I should refresh dots or not.


Try out this macro for SS

#showtooltip Starsurge
/cancelqueuedspell
/assist [help]
/use Starsurge

First giant red flag was the Starfire/Sunfire uptimes.

Make sure you are talking about the correct spells because as far as I know, you can not really have an uptime on starfire. I think(and hope) you are talking about moonfire.

[Nioso]

http://raidbot.com/comparebot/52823f...010000cb#buffs (Looks broken right now?)

Yeah, I was taking a look at Starfires and I am right on top of your logs. It seems a lot of my problem is coming from mismanagement of dots. My logs from last night were greatly improved in comparison to where I was at. I actually had some amazing openers on Heroic Thok attempts where I was in the top 10 DPS. I have put more emphasis on dotting and re-dotting every thing when I have buffs up. My NG up time is still low, but what I have been noticing is I will some times clip my stronger applied dot and re-apply a shittier dot. So now I am trying to work on not instantly applying Moonfire and Sunfire as soon as I hit an eclipse, but rather only applying the dot that is eclipsed powered and waiting to re-apply until the other is about to fall off. Is there a moonkin equivalent to the mage's combustion helper to kind of indicate the power of the dots for easy tracking?

Also making sure I explode my shrooms with full procs on pull helped my initial burst. I am still unsure if I should be using Astral Communion when I am too far away from Thok for example. It could be a nice way to push eclipses faster when there is nothing to shoot and/or I am out of NG. Any thoughts on this?

http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/r...=10045&e=10307

Heroic Thok best attempt had an extremely low NG uptime, so I am a little confused by that: http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/r...?s=4779&e=5103

Normal Thok was a little lack luster and still under where I needed to be with NG up time.

Normal Blackfuse still needs improving, NG up time is still lower by about 10%, but that's literally one to two more pushes. Probably just need to be positioned better to always be casting.

My Normal Paragons was pretty solid until I pulled aggro on a Kuchong we half assed and didn't burn down. I think the other druid pulled aggro on it right before or after and died as well. But hey, I was neck and neck with my buddy.

Garrosh needs improvement, once again I need to have like one to two more eclipse pushes.

PS, thanks for the responses.

- - - Updated - - -

Question on lust: Some of our fights, lust goes out before my 3 minute buffs are up if I use them on CD. Is it worth holding them until the lust goes out or will logs always come out higher if we are pushing our buffs as soon as they are off CD in hopes of getting a 3rd and some times 4th set depending on the fight? Obviously I can test this myself, but I am curious if you guys have any experience with this.

Also regarding Starfall and CDs coming back. Should I hold the starfall when I am coming back to pre-lunar phase for a second/third/fourth opener? Up until now, I have been popping it as soon as I hit lunar which means I only get 2 starfalls at max when my 3 minute CDs are used after the initial pull CDs. Also I don't always line my CDs up with a pre-lunar re-opener, I am not sure if this is a must or if using the CDs ASAP is more important.

*Note: Hopefully this isn't too confusing! It may be poorly worded and long winded.

[xtramuscle]

I am still unsure if I should be using Astral Communion when I am too far away from Thok for example. It could be a nice way to push eclipses faster when there is nothing to shoot and/or I am out of NG. Any thoughts on this?

If you can't reach the boss, you could use AC to get close to the next eclipse (but don't enter it as you'll lose NG uptime). However to be perfectly honest, if you can't reach the boss, you need to think more about your positioning that your rotation. Obviously later into the phase he has a crazy speed buff and is hard to keep up with him. But don't stand still and re-dot, or cast instant SS's. Both this, and casting starfall allows you to move without ANY dps loss. Use this, plan ahead, and maintain as high uptime on the boss/jailer as possible. An ideal position would allow you to dot both, yielding higher SS procs for boss dps.

[Nioso]

That's exactly what I was doing; double dipping on the jailer and had my CDs up just in time for when the bats came down. As far as positioning, I was moving with him until the point I couldn't keep up with him without using speed boost CDs. At that point, I would AC and wait for him to get within range of the raid group cluster while being ready to take off at a moments notice with speed boosts.

[Justinsroy]

Make sure you are talking about the correct spells because as far as I know, you can not really have an uptime on starfire. I think(and hope) you are talking about moonfire.

Yes. Was talking about moonfire/sunfire. My bad. Was looking at the right %'s, wrong names when I typed.

[Slaymode]

Yes. Was talking about moonfire/sunfire. My bad. Was looking at the right %'s, wrong names when I typed.

I get them confused all the time lol.