Haromm's + TED vs Heroic AoC for Windwalker

[Deleted]

After a lot of reading through this forum it is clear that the "best" trinket setup for Windwalker DPS is heavily debated. A while back I decided to stop using Ascension in favour of Chi Brew, dropped my normal Assurance of Consequence and now use Haromm's Talisman + Ticking Ebon Detonator, increasing my haste up to around 12000 to compensate, and have spent a lot of time adjusting to the change. I missed the reduced CD on Energizing Brew and the passive haste boost for a while but eventually warmed to the new playstyle.

My guild are now progressing heroics and a couple of days ago I rolled a Heroic AoC from Sha. My question(s) for you who are experienced Windwalker players who have experimented more with different trinkets and stat builds; is it worth it to equip this heroic AoC, change my gems again and re-adjust to the new style? If so, which trinket should I replace and what is an acceptable amount of haste to drop to if I can use EB more often?


Thanks!

[Babylonius]

The "Best" trinket setup for WW is not debated at all. Haromm's and AoC are the "best"; however AoC is difficult to use and for 95% of the raiders out there will result in a DPS loss, this makes Haromm's and TED the best trinket.

Assuming both your Haromm's and TED are at least normal quality or better, you're better off sticking with them over the H AoC.

[Enpoli]

I would honestly say it's closer to 99.x% of raiders. Do you know of any high parsing WW Monks using AoC?

[Deleted]

The "Best" trinket setup for WW is not debated at all. Haromm's and AoC are the "best"; however AoC is difficult to use and for 95% of the raiders out there will result in a DPS loss, this makes Haromm's and TED the best trinket.

Assuming both your Haromm's and TED are at least normal quality or better, you're better off sticking with them over the H AoC.

Would you mind briefly explaining where the difficulty is with using AoC over TED, or what the player must do to turn it into a DPS gain? If it can potentially be better then I'd like to learn how to use it properly.

Both my Haromm's and TED are normal quality (561), I have not put any points into the new AoC yet so it is at 566.

[Miles]

Would you mind briefly explaining where the difficulty is with using AoC over TED, or what the player must do to turn it into a DPS gain? If it can potentially be better then I'd like to learn how to use it properly.

For AoC to be a DPS increase, you'd have to use Fist of Fury pretty much when it comes off cooldown every time. Since FoF has a lot of rules for when it should be used, timing this is ridiculously hard.

[Babylonius]

AoC is difficult to use because it decreases the CD on FoF. This may seem like a good thing, but with current raid design FoF is difficult to make a dps increase. In order for FoF to be a dps increase there are several requirements to be met. You can't cap energy, can't push off using RSK, can't stop the channel before it's over by movement, all targets it hits have to be useful damage and for the whole duration, and EB has to be on CD.

Because it takes all that to make FoF a dps increase it is hard enough to meet all those requirements every 25s without AoC. Reducing the CD on FoF doesnt make it easier to use, it makes it less likely all the requirements will met when it's off CD. This cuts down on the usefulness of a big part of AoC which pushes it below TED.

Theoretically, if you can make near full use of EB and FoF with the shortened CD then AoC is better, but it is so difficult to do regularly and the reward for it is currently so small that even the best WW aren't wasting their time.

When 6.0 hits. FoF is getting buffed enough that we'll be using it as often as possible and the list of requirements will be much much shorter.

[Deleted]

I understand now, thanks very much for the help. I'll stick with what I've got.

[Serendepityz]

Theoretically, if you can make near full use of EB and FoF with the shortened CD then AoC is better, but it is so difficult to do regularly and the reward for it is currently so small that even the best WW aren't wasting their time.

While this is true, one thing not mentioned which contributes to the lack of AoC being used is the amount of AoE that is in the tier. Look at fights like Fallen Protectors, Galakras, Dark shamans, Siegecrafter (without belts) and Spoils.

All of these fights call for as close to 100% RJW uptime as possible, and at some point I've had a top 5 parse on all of them and I'm 99% sure it wasn't with using FoF even once due to the requirement of using all of your chi that you generate to keep up RSK and TP buff. And adding a 4.4 sec CD of RJW into the mix of your already decently sized checklist, it wont happen.

With that said, the only fights I can see AoC actually outperforming TED in action would be Malkorok, Iron Juggernaut, Norushen, and MAYBE garrosh but i doubt it. And to be blunt I'm personally just to lazy to reforge for those fights and test it to see if it is actually better.

[Cerom]

Also once 6.0 hits AoC will be useless. The CD reduction is nerfed to 2%. So there is that as well.

[Babylonius]

Also once 6.0 hits AoC will be useless. The CD reduction is nerfed to 2%. So there is that as well.

That's what it is on the beta, before the balance tuning phase. They often break old trinkets and procs so that you have to test the new ones. Until there is official word that the change is happening for those trinkets we can assume it will not change the day 6.0 comes out, possibly get less useful as you level.

[Jocias]

That's what it is on the beta, before the balance tuning phase. They often break old trinkets and procs so that you have to test the new ones. Until there is official word that the change is happening for those trinkets we can assume it will not change the day 6.0 comes out, possibly get less useful as you level.

While I won't claim to be a seer, I think it's a safe bet that they will nerf AoC into the ground come 6.0. It's telling that they're removing readiness as a stat. To continue to include a trinket that directly contradicts their design intent for stats even in the weeks prior to the launch of WoD seems dubious at best. If they don't nerf it, great. I look forward to using FoF on CD. Every 13 seconds? But, if you're a spec that's currently using AoC, I'd start looking at getting your third BiS trinket prior to the release of 6.0, because I'm pretty sure that they'll keep the nerf in place.

[Totaltotemic]

While I won't claim to be a seer, I think it's a safe bet that they will nerf AoC into the ground come 6.0. It's telling that they're removing readiness as a stat. To continue to include a trinket that directly contradicts their design intent for stats even in the weeks prior to the launch of WoD seems dubious at best. If they don't nerf it, great. I look forward to using FoF on CD. Every 13 seconds? But, if you're a spec that's currently using AoC, I'd start looking at getting your third BiS trinket prior to the release of 6.0, because I'm pretty sure that they'll keep the nerf in place.

Everyone should have Haromm's and TED anyways. Having an AoC on the off chance that it actually becomes useful in 6.0 and they put in the extra work to make it viable for another month would be nice, but it's an awful trinket for most fights right now anyways, it definitely shouldn't be your only option.

[dennix]

Personally i use a Haromm's (H), TED (HC WF) and AoC (H) I switch between the latter for various fights.
AoC I use for fights that don't make FoF usage excessively hard. (Noru, Sha, Iron, Malk, Thok, Seige(belts) and Garrosh)

A topic I've not seen discussed in this thread is the ability to snapshot FoF, making it easier to make it effective. Using it on your last second of TEB or trinket procs can extent said buff for a bit. This doesn't make your job any easier unfortunately, it's just something to make it more worthwhile.

I'm contemplating using AoC in combination with TED so the change you can snapshot an high agility FoF is increased, though i doubt this is not worth it.

[Babylonius]

FoF will snapshot Agi procs, but not TEB. This helps make TED slightly more useful if you can snapshot early in the proc, however that's only if you can still follow the previous rules for keeping FoF a dps increase.

Using AoC/TED will never be advised due to how strong Haromms is. Haromms is never discussed when deciding between trinkets because it's the far and away best.

[Jocias]

FoF will snapshot Agi procs, but not TEB. This helps make TED slightly more useful if you can snapshot early in the proc, however that's only if you can still follow the previous rules for keeping FoF a dps increase.

Using AoC/TED will never be advised due to how strong Haromms is. Haromms is never discussed when deciding between trinkets because it's the far and away best.

To expand on what Babs said, using FoF to extend a TED proc at 0 seconds isn't really doing much for you. The way TED works is that the magnitude of the proc degrades over time. At 0 seconds, the added agi from TED is negligible. Using FoF to extend the proc from Haromm's or AoC is worthwhile, however, assuming you don't commit any of the cardinal sins of FoF. The chances of the stars aligning and you being able to actually FoF at 0 seconds on a Haromm's proc without breaking the rules for FoF might happen once or twice in an entire raid night. If you happen to get much more use out of it than that, you should consider buying some lottery tickets.

Also, I don't know where the rumor got started that FoF snapshots TeB, but it doesn't. If your TeB falls off in the middle of your FoF, the FoF ticks that happen under the effect of TeB retain the damage increase. The ticks that fall outside of the duration of TeB do no benefit from the damage increase. If you hear anyone mention FoF snapshotting TeB, please give them a friendly smack to the back of the head and correct them.