BM Relic Question

[briggz]

Hey Everyone,

So I know where all the relics sit for individual situations based on the sims in the icy veins guide, but now that night hold has several bosses that have cleave its not that simple since we can't just swap out relics per fight. How are you guys ranking furious swipes compare to pack/jaws?

The reason I ask is I got a 890 Swipes one last night that would replace an 870 jaws. After thinking about it for a while I decided to use the swipes one since it will help a lot in M+ too.

[natrodamus]

Raiding is about priority targets, and since you don't use beast cleave on every fight you are basically wasting that relic on those fights. I would keep the Jaws relic for now. Probably the only relic I would lose a Jaws or Pack Leader for is Unleash the Beast given the item level difference is decent.

It sucks that you have to destroy a relic to replace it. They should have made it interchangeable like talents, not permanent like gems.

[Effinhunter]

Whether 15+ Mythic+ or Mythic raiding, you should be using single target relics as BM. If you have a 870+ Jaws relic, you should only replace it with Pack Leader or Jaws. BM's 3 trait investment in Furious Swipes is more than enough for any high end activities. It's single target that you have to optimize for for high Mythic+ or raiding. Please do not replace your Jaws/Packleader with beast cleave. It's only going to hurt your efforts in 15+ keys.

Luckily, Nighthold has BM relics available on first boss in whatever difficulty you can get in. Even Mythic Skorpyron is puggable right now (it's a complete pushover of an encounter), and you have two great BM relics right there.

[briggz]

Probably should have posted this question while I was thinking about the swap, and not after I had already destroyed the 870 jaws :/

[DarkAviator]

So, also stay with a 865 Jaws instead of a 895 Aspect of the Wild?

[Effinhunter]

So, also stay with a 865 Jaws instead of a 895 Aspect of the Wild?

I would say yes, though Wild actually has a single target contribution so it's not as bad a tradeoff. If you go to the theorycrafting thread, do a Ctrl+F and enter "BM Relic Upgrades, Single Target". This will show you the single target breakdown. It's been pretty consistent since EN, as far as trait increase vs weapon ilvl increase.

The sims are done by actual weapon ilvl increases--not the relic level. 865 (+48 weapon ilvl) -> 895 (+56 weapon ilvl) is an increase of 8 weapon ilvls. This straddles the line in single target. That's probably an ok upgrade, especially if you have something that augments Wild's effectiveness--e.g., the bracers (http://www.wowhead.com/item=137101/call-of-the-wild). But it's a marginal improvement in ST and a small improvement in AoE. Probably a safe upgrade for now (though swapped immediately on 895+ Jaws/Packleader, like from first boss in Nighthold).

[Deleted]

Hope this helps...


Choosing the right Relics

Beast Mastery relics fall into the 3 categories listed below. "High Value" relic traits are significantly ahead of the others and provide enough of a DPS boost to counter large ilevel upgrades in many cases. The reason for this is Beast Mastery benefits very little from the weapon DPS upgrades from relics (though it does benefit from the stats), and the best traits are significant damage boosts. In some cases, this can mean doing things such as trading in a heroic raid relic with a bad trait for a mythic dungeon relic with a good trait.

Important note: When talking about relic ilevel here, we are referring to the ilevel added to Titanstrike by the relic, NOT the ilevel of the relic item itself.

High Value Relic Traits

Both Kill Command traits are worth the equivalent of a 9 ilevel upgrade to Titanstrike in single target. The Beast Cleave trait is obviously only useful for AoE damage, but with the importance of Mythic+ it should be considered extremely high value if that's your focus for Beast Mastery. Both Kill Command traits are identically valued, so when comparing between those pick the highest ilevel. Given the choice between buffing Beast Cleave or Kill Command, you generally want to favor Kill Command (unless your focus is purely on dungeons). For raiding, you should attempt to have Kill Command traits on at least 2 of your relics.
Pack Leader -- worth +9 Titanstrike ilvl
Jaws of Thunder -- worth +9 Titanstrike ilvl
Furious Swipes -- worth +15 Titanstrike ilvl (only for AoE DPS!)
DPS Relic Traits

These are worth the equivalent of a 1-5 ilevel upgrade to Titanstrike.
Unleash the Beast -- worth +5 Titanstrike ilvl
Wilderness Expert -- worth +1 Titanstrike ilvl
Spitting Cobras -- worth +2 Titanstrike ilvl

Relic Choice Examples

The following are some examples of how to value a particular relic based on its ilevel and trait.
Example 1: A relic with Pack Leader and +40 ilevels is roughly the same value as a relic with Mimiron's Shell and +49 ilevels.
Example 2: A relic with Unleash the Beast and +46 ilevels is roughly the same value as a relic with Pack Leader and +42 ilevels.


Source: http://www.wowhead.com/beast-mastery...nd-relic-guide

[Deleted]

It's worth to note that pack leader ads to the spirit bond trait while jaws of thunder does not.