Ret, hit rating and expertise.

[Cafisho]

Hi, i've read sometime ago that 295 hit rating is the cap, but i've also read that it was lowered recently and expertise was needed (something like 25, or so). Anyone could tell me what's the exact number of both things, if needed.

Thanks!

[Offhand]

This is brought up on a weekly basis. Search function...

[Adamson]

While both stats are nice to have, once you have over 200 hit rating don't worry about either anymore. Get thema s they come but for dps purposes just stack strength wherever you can.

[Whoopzz]

What I find funny is that he knows the exact numbers of which each respective stat is needed that is in question, yet he still asks.

[Cafisho]

What I find funny is that he knows the exact numbers of which each respective stat is needed that is in question, yet he still asks.

If i were sure that those are the stats i wouldn't post them over here. In the post above you someone says that with over 200 HR it's fine... so, it isn't funny.

Thanks Adamson for the info.

[Torax]

8% hit rating is needed to cap 2H as far as I know, contrary to the previous 9% requirement. Not sure how much hit rating you'd need for that but meh.

As for expertise, the cap is 26 afaik, and you need just above 200 expertise rating to achieve that.

Don't quote me on any of this though, I'm not 100% sure.

[Indris]

Needed for what? You don't need either stat for PvE dps, only thing you want to "cap" hit for is PvP (and you certainly don't "need" expertise for that either), and that's a different number from the cap you'd want for raiding.

[eodem]

Needed for what? You don't need either stat for PvE dps, only thing you want to "cap" hit for is PvP (and you certainly don't "need" expertise for that either), and that's a different number from the cap you'd want for raiding.

It's not about needing. It's about maximising DPS.

8% hit is hitcapped for +3 Mobs, 26 Expertise is soft cap (removes Boss dodge from front/side). Hard cap for Expertise is not availeble ingame.

[clarizzana]

You don't "need" a weapon to do pve dps either.

Afaik, the parrycap is 57 expertise. But after you have achieved dodgecap at 26 expertise the stat points are better spent elsewhere.

So 8% hit an 26 expertise is a"goal" for any raider that does dps with a 2hander.

[Grimbold]

Needed for what? You don't need either stat for PvE dps, only thing you want to "cap" hit for is PvP (and you certainly don't "need" expertise for that either), and that's a different number from the cap you'd want for raiding.

so you want to miss a lot?

Hit is idd needed to maximize your dps, i got 240 smth and i hardly miss anymore, while when i had 90-120 i was constanly annoyed due to the misses

expertise is 26.

[Indris]

/facepalm

Hit is a decent stat for a Ret Paladin, but you don't "NEED" to cap it to maximize your DPS, if anything, gemming / enchanting towards hit will nerf your damage output compared to str / ap enchants.

Expertise is just plain bad, considering it doesn't affect a good 35% of our damage (if not more), why would you even care about it?

Stop spreading your misinformed opinions if you don't know what you're talking about, please.

[Grimbold]

/facepalm

Hit is a decent stat for a Ret Paladin, but you don't "NEED" to cap it to maximize your DPS, if anything, gemming / enchanting towards hit will nerf your damage output compared to str / ap enchants.

Expertise is just plain bad, considering it doesn't affect a good 35% of our damage (if not more), why would you even care about it?

Stop spreading your misinformed opinions if you don't know what you're talking about, please.

Ok then im failing to understand how Hit aint needed. Honestly , can you explain it to me and to all others that think over 200 Hit is needed?

[Indris]

In a vast majority of realistic gear setup scenarios, 10 Str will increase your DPS by a higher factor than 10 hit rating will.

Hit can only generally pull ahead in two cases; either you've got INSANE amounts of attack power / crit / haste and absolutely no hit, eventually you will reach a point where hit takes over str since as your ap increases the DPS value of each point of hit progressively grows higher (this isn't really something worth considering, though, as amounts of AP / crit required to skew the numbers so much as far as I'm aware aren't possible to achieve, and you will have a solid amount of hit rating from your gear regardless if you want it or not, anyway)

The second scenario would be if your gear is lower quality and you're suffering from mana regen problems, with occasional missed judgements setting you back even more on mana - but again, this is pretty much a moot point because if your gear is so bad you can't sustain a decent DPS rotation, you're bound to have a pathetically low amount of Str, which naturally causes the value of hit to diminish.

Get any sort of a decent DPS spreadsheet for a ret paladin if you don't believe me and can't be bothered testing it yourself, download Rawr or something - every model out there will tell you, Str > Hit, regardless if you're capped or not.

If you're wondering how is this possible, that's because of several reasons. First of all, all our attacks scale extremelly well with Str, because our key abilities - Judgement & Seals are affected both by attack power and spellpower, and we happen to gain spellpower from attack power. Secondly, hitting harder with your JoB/JoM and SoB/SoM causes you to take more knockback damage - which in return results in more mana regen, which will offset the occasional judgement miss anyway. Third, not only Str scales with Blessing of Kings, but also our 15% Str talent. Then if you consider raid buffs, again some of the most important ones are percentile based - unleashed rage is the one worth noting the most.

Hit on the contrary does not benefit from any extra bonuses, you get what you get, and that's it. Expertise in this regard is even worse, as it doesn't affect our primary source of damage - Judgement - and several secondary attacks eg consec, exo, HoW as well.

So like I said, hit is "okay" but by no means a stat that must be capped at all costs, and expertise is just bad. And you know what's annoying? This is about 500th time I'm explaining this >_>

[Grisham]

Because Strength is nearly twice as better (stat wise) - you should ALWAYS gem for it which basically means ignoring every socket bonus, aside of the rare +8Str ones and go full 16Str everywhere.

Hit is just good to avoid getting a miss on a Judgment because it affects your mana regen but it is absolutely not a primary stat.

To understand it you need to do/read some serious math but once you've done you'll see that "aiming for hit/exp cap" is a direct way to loose tons of DPS

[eodem]

/facepalm

Hit is a decent stat for a Ret Paladin, but you don't "NEED" to cap it to maximize your DPS, if anything, gemming / enchanting towards hit will nerf your damage output compared to str / ap enchants.

Expertise is just plain bad, considering it doesn't affect a good 35% of our damage (if not more), why would you even care about it?

Stop spreading your misinformed opinions if you don't know what you're talking about, please.

No body said anything about gemming/enchanting for Hit... it's just a good stat, gemming/enchanting should ALWAYS be Str>Atk. In any case Hit Cap and Expertise Soft Cap can both be reached by gear alone and shouldn't be enchanted or gemmed for... EVER.

Expertise is a stat that can save lives. Think about how many 'traditional' dragons Blizz implemented or bosses where you just can't attack from behind. Yes attacking from behind makes Expertise worth 0 (read: zero) value. BUT attacking from the sides the boss will have some form of Dodge and Parry (180 degrees of a bosses hitbox). Ever heard of Parry Hasting? Try to inform yourself before misinforming others.

The reason we only go for Soft Cap on Expertise is this: Dodge+Parry removal untill 26 Expertise. After that it's just Parry, so the weight of the point is not worth it compared to other points (it will be close to Haste after soft cap). And due to mechanics of Hit/Miss/Dodge/Parry Push (functions about the same as the push for tanks) you won't endanger the tank (and with it the raid) when you do happen to attack from a different position then the back of the boss.

Now go flame me ;D

[Indris]

No body said anything about gemming/enchanting for Hit... it's just a good stat, gemming/enchanting should ALWAYS be Str>Atk. In any case Hit Cap and Expertise Soft Cap can both be reached by gear alone and shouldn't be enchanted or gemmed for... EVER.

Expertise is a stat that can save lives. Think about how many 'traditional' dragons Blizz implemented or bosses where you just can't attack from behind. Yes attacking from behind makes Expertise worth 0 (read: zero) value. BUT attacking from the sides the boss will have some form of Dodge and Parry (180 degrees of a bosses hitbox). Ever heard of Parry Hasting? Try to inform yourself before misinforming others.

The reason we only go for Soft Cap on Expertise is this: Dodge+Parry removal untill 26 Expertise. After that it's just Parry, so the weight of the point is not worth it compared to other points (it will be close to Haste after soft cap). And due to mechanics of Hit/Miss/Dodge/Parry Push (functions about the same as the push for tanks) you won't endanger the tank (and with it the raid) when you do happen to attack from a different position then the back of the boss.

Now go flame me ;D

Name ONE BOSS where you HAVE to be attacking from the front? And by the way, attacking from behind you still can be dodged.

[eodem]

Though to a less degree.

Mind that I did not say from the front. I said NOT from the back. Thaddius is almost not doable all fight. Saphiron is also hard with Blizzards going. Need more?

[Grimbold]

Thanks for your explanation , but please take in consideration that i didnt meant the Hit>Str. I do know whats my primary stat. Let me explain it to you, simple actually : when i first started HC Naxx i was noticing an amount of misses that would be enough to annoy me. So i started searching and ended up at elite jerks where i read the thread refering to the Retri pala ( 1st page mainly cause the dude explained every stat )ill even post here what i read in order for you to understand my point of view : "Stats (In order of importance)
Strength
Our best DPS stat, as we have various talents that multiply it's effect. 1 STR gives you 2 AP baseline, multiplied by 1.15 from Divine Strength (Tier 1 Prot) giving us 2.3 AP per STR when specced. This number is further affected by buffs such as BoK. You should be stacking as much STR as possible.

Hit * See Observations, Bugs
32.8 rating gives you 1% hit. At level 80, we should require 262 hit rating, or 8%, to be hit capped on white swings, specials, and judgements (read: bugs section, ghost hit). Note that Exorcism and Consecration are considered spells and use the spell hit table, thus we can still miss with these abilities. You want to be hit capped to maximize your DPS, but any hit after the cap is wasted itemization points, so gear accordingly.

Expertise
Introduced in late BC, this stat allows us to remove dodges from the attack table when attacking from behind, as melee often does! You need 26 Expertise (214 rating, 6.5%) to cap this stat; much like hit, any expertise after the cap is wasted. Capping this stat is a significant dps increase vs uncapped (or none at all) as it affects our whites, strikes, and SoB.

Crit See Observations
We are quite reliant on critical strikes to do damage. You can never really have too much crit, but it is not worth gemming for it, gem for STR instead. You need 45.9 crit rating to gain 1% crit at 80. This stat gains no benefits from raid buffs, but you get more per itemization point from crit than you do AGI. This stat also increases your spell crit rating, making it flat out superior to AGI.

Agility
We need 52.08 agility to gain 1% melee crit. Like stated before, crit is flat out better, however AGI does scale with raid buffs such as BoK where crit does not.

Attack Power
AP is somewhere in the middle of the pack as far as stats go; most of our skills scale off AP, but STR is just so much better. AP isn't really seen on plate (so you often don't have to worry about this) but you will run into it if you dip into leather and mail. Note that despite AP having a 2:1 item stat budget, it is far weaker than STR as we have no talents that boost it's effect. When comparing or considering pieces with AP, you need to look at the item as a whole (does the plate have haste and ArPen (bad), while the the leather has AP/hit/crit/agi (decent) ).

Intellect
Due to some mechanic changes late in 3.0, intellect has once again become somewhat useful to retribution. 1 INT gives you 15 mana and a negligible amount of spell crit. It has become useful because of the way Replenishment and JoW work, which returns mana per second based on your TOTAL mana pool. In an upcoming patch (3.0., JoW will return base mana only, but Replenishment will function the same. Once again, don't bother gemming or going out of your way to find INT, but don't turn your nose at certain hunter/enh shaman mail either.

Haste
Was great (for horde) in late BC, but due to huge mechanic changes regarding our seals and instant attacks, haste went from scaling equally with STR to the "meh" it is now. Haste increases white damage and SoB/SoM damage by giving you a few more attacks against a boss; haste does NOT decrease the GCD on our instant strikes or instant spells. You will find plenty of it on our sets and pieces, but it sure isn't something you want to enchant or gem for. You need 32.7 haste rating to gain 1% haste at 80.

Armor Penetration
Bad stat for retribution - over 60% of our damage is holy, which ignores armor anyways. 15.4 rating gives you 1% armor piercing; unlike BC, you can no longer fully ignore boss or player armor via this stat. ArPen does NOT increase damage done by seals, just white damage, CS and DS. Avoid this stat.

Spellpower
Bad stat for us. Spellpower increases some of our skills' coefficients, but at a rate much slower than STR/AP, and does nothing for our white damage and instant melee strikes - CS and DS gain nothing from spellpower. Avoid this stat (easy to do, since none of our ret gear has spellpower).

Stamina, Armor
Ultimately, stam does nothing more than keep you alive in situations where there is raid damage, and in wrath there is a lot of raid damage. Most of the damage is magic (not mitigated by armor) therefor armor class does not matter to us, as we have no Armored to the Teeth talents like warriors or deathknights. You'll find all the stam you need and much much more on all wrath gear. "

So Ilovepeaches this is what i based my Hit info on. But yours cleared some doubts aswell.

[Indris]

Though to a less degree.

Mind that I did not say from the front. I said NOT from the back. Thaddius is almost not doable all fight. Saphiron is also hard with Blizzards going. Need more?

There isn't some gray zone that's neither back nor front in WoW. You're either dpsing from the front, or dpsing from the back, there are no sides.

You're right about Thaddius, and that's the only thing I can think of myself really, it's a very hard hitting boss and tank deaths is great risk there, right? As for Sapphiron, have fun eating 20k cleaves I guess, if you can't position properly ...


@ Grimbold

I know about that EJ post, but it's outdated and either not entirely accurate or poorly worded. It states that "capping expertise is a significant DPS increase", well duh if you're comparing two paladins with identical stats, only one of them has 0 expertise while the other has 26, the latter will do more damage. But it's still a pretty lousy stat that's worth little when compared to other things you can get. Same goes for hit, yeah sure having capped hit makes you do more DPS. But if you could convert some of that hit into Str, you'd be doing better.

The best you can do if you aren't really into doing maths on that stuff yourself is download Rawr and put your own stats into it, then see for yourself what will truly maximize your DPS. I can guarantee though, it'll only confirm what I'm saying here.


By the way, I'm sorry if I came off as arrogant or rude in my posts, but it just pisses me off so much seeing posts from newer players asking about value of expertise / hit on pretty much a daily basis, and being told by a crowd that yeah you should cap both, and then some will add that gemming for hit is a good idea too - when it's just downright wrong. It's just so frustrating to see people accept wrong information for truth, and then they feed their own misinformation further, and it's a neverending circle of false assumptions. Don't mean to get personal, or something.

[Grimbold]

Ye np dude.

I must admit im kinda new to the ret scene, since i spent 3 years as Holy :P

But on topic , i apreaciate the info . I usually gear / gem / enchant according to what annoys me the most hehe i know its weird. So basicly i was satisfied with the Str i had at that time, and wanting to be a crit machine and not to miss often made me go for hit gear and putting a 16crit gem once in a while.

But can you go for rly conserning gear? Warrior gear again i supose which has Crit,Hit,ArP etc. So i usually go for the ones with Crit and Hit. I keep hearing Rets dont have use for haste has they used to and still our tier items have that stat.