3.1 PTR DPS surprising results

[Gwa]

Hello,

Ive been testing various dps specs on the PTR for a few weeks while keeping a close eye on what those guys over at EJ were doing.

having tested a few specs here are a few results,

UNholy 2h 13/0/58....best sustained dps over 10mins 3600dps on Boss target dummy in Ebon hold.
Blood: (tried 44/0/27, 51/0/20 and 51/13/7)....best dps 3100 sustained.
Frost: 13/51/7: 3200dps sustained.

These were all in 4parts T7.5 with every slot best in game except no Greatness card and no BoH (using Deaths Bite). (Exp and Hit capped)

Most surprising thing i noticed was when playing around in frost spec.....
With 4 parts T7.5, in Blood Pressence, theres no way u can feasibly spend all ur RP ( not enough GCD)
I tried in Unholy Pressence....dps was similar (around 3100dps).
I then swapped my T7.5 for a lot of Armour Penetration gear (ArP). I found i was getting about 200 dps more!!! Sustained 3400 with 0 CDs used for 10mins!!

This confused me somewhat as the boys over at EJ reckon that the T7.5 set bonus is so good for frost that a lot are considering still using T7.5 instead of T8!
After checking my recount, it quickly became obvious where the extra dps was coming from....Obliterate.
In T7.5, Frost strike is your main dps ability...and usually by quite a margin. In ArP gear i found Obliterate accounting for most of my damage (just) with 31.7% of damage coming from Obliterate.
I also found that using ArP gear, in blood pressence i had no shortage of RP whatsoever.

Discuss.....

Gradius/Gwa

[Felblood]

Damn overpowered.. i can only hit 2.5k on a target dummy..

[Beachbum]

You made no mention of rotation. Your DPS as Frost with a reasonable rotation should be ahead of Blood by a larger margin, especially if on the usual 1 hp dummy.

I don't know why you put excess talents into the Unholy subspec for Frost either, toss four more into Dark Conviction which will boost your DPS. Additionally, swapping to ArP gear you simply lost the T7.25 bonus, which drops another Frost Strike (basically) out of the rotation. Given that FS with your gear probably crits around 7.5k, and you should be above 50% crit with it, that's a pretty substantial DPS loss over a rotation. I'd be interested to see your strike numbers for OB though with and without the ArP gear on, that's something I have to test this week for myself now that 3.1 looks to be nearing final tuning.

No comments of glyphs either, basically your numbers could be pulled from wherever . I don't fully accept the argument that T7 > T8 for Frost in 3.1, but there's too much data missing from your post to have any meaningful discussion at all.

[Kaspar]

Frost 13/51/7 isn't optimal for DPS imo.

17/51/3.

[bujaberry]

Dummies aren't good targets to test dps.

As blood or frost you miss your major "raid" buff, being sunderarmor, whereas majority of uholy's dmg is spell, and you provide yourself with ebonplague.

Dummies have retardedly high amounts of armor, necrosis isn't included due to the dummy @ 1hp.

Not to mention scaling with raid buffs is another factor that makes comparing dummy dps bad.

PS. They're called training dummies, and as stated by blues, they're there so u can practice your rotations, not compare dps from different specs.

In conclusion, dummy dps comparison != actual dps comparison

[Gwa]

thanks for some of the feedback.
Ill try to address some of the points made above;

Frost vs Blood dps. I found that stacking ArP gear in blood brought me much closer to Frosts dps...i have around 20% ArP from gear. Blood is still very low and u have to burn CDs to get anywhere near Frost with 0 CDs.

Frost Glyphs: IT, Obl, FS.
Rotation: IT>PS>BS>BS>OB> FS>FS>OB>FS>OB>FS>OB repeat. (using HB on proc)

The point i shoulda made clearer is that in T7.5, FS accounts for exactly the same amount of damage as in ArP gear....its is only Ob doing substantially more damage that is boosting numbers. In T7.5 + Blood pressence u have an excess of RP (wih not enough GCDs to burn it).....with ArP gear on you have enough for FS whenever u need it....just not an excess.

Epidemic Vs Dark Conviction: I found Epidemic gave much more dps due to more time for Ob + FS. Without dark Conviction i was gettin 59% Ob Crit, and 62% FS Crit. That is enough imo. Also, 5% crit is 5% crit; extra attacks in your rotation between IT>PS re-apply scales much better and is more flexible.
Ive always found Epidemic works well in 2h rotations...except diseaseless blood.

Boss dummy as a dps indicator: Yes it is not ideal, but sunder will only increase Ob damage further...i tested using Grim Atol to simulate sunder....my Ob was hitting around 1000damage more when trinket proc was up. So i think Sunder will add around 3% dps to Frost (quite a bit more to Blood).
Im not too sure which spec will scale best in raids when buffed atm. In the past ive always found Unholy gets more benefit from raid buffs....we will have to wait and see.

Regards,

Gradius/Gwa

[Kaspar]

Drop glyph of IT and take Glyph of disease instead.

[Gwa]

why? Glyph of Disease wastes a Blood rune for no damage, that does not regen as a Death rune.....so loosing a OB from ur rotation. Testing has been done on this glyph already. Check EJ forums for results.

[Kaspar]

why? Glyph of Disease wastes a Blood rune for no damage, that does not regen as a Death rune.....so loosing a OB from ur rotation. Testing has been done on this glyph already. Check EJ forums for results.

Blood of the North applies to Pestilence. Ergo, a death rune.

[GT4]

I'm getting ~3600 DPS over >5 minutes against the boss target dummy without HB affecting any other targets next to it as Frost. That's using a 17/51/3 build, HB/FS/Oblit glyphs, FC enchant and a HB>Oblit>BS>BS>Dump>HB>Oblit>Oblit>Dump (+Rime Procs) like rotation without Merciless Combat (I specced out of it so my results aren't flawed).
That's using real best in slot gear (yours isn't full best in slot at all) and the Flame Leviathan 25 ring.

[kudzupo]

To be honest, the point of comparing boss test dummy goes beyond missing certain raid buffs. Each build will perform differently, better or worse, depending on which buffs it can bring. For example, having icy talons on a raid boss dummy is very beneficial. Also, you must be wary of other buffs on the bosses from other people (for example, if you test in ebon hold, ebon plague will almost always be up, or if you test somewhere else you may be hitting more than one target on some abilities).

Dummy testing has its uses, beyond just testing rotations. One very useful way to test on a dummy is to compare specs within the same tree. For example, comparing 20/51/0 to 3/51/17 is useful on a dummy, since they both take relatively the same talents, you just need to take into account necrosis. But comparing 3/51/17 to 0/10/61 is useless because each one is bringing different buffs, has different abilities which are effected differently by buffs. This is even if you don't spec into certain abilities (like merciless combat).

So, just bear in mind, boss dummy testing is useful for inter-spec comparisons unlike what some people have said, but comparing cross-specs is a bad idea.

[Gwa]

I'm getting ~3600 DPS over >5 minutes against the boss target dummy without HB affecting any other targets next to it as Frost. That's using a 17/51/3 build, HB/FS/Oblit glyphs, FC enchant and a HB>Oblit>BS>BS>Dump>HB>Oblit>Oblit>Dump (+Rime Procs) like rotation without Merciless Combat (I specced out of it so my results aren't flawed).
That's using real best in slot gear (yours isn't full best in slot at all) and the Flame Leviathan 25 ring.

...best in slot for UNHOLY (my raid spec), except greatness and BoH. And no armoury link or number from yourself apart from '~3600' ...and the fact that u r an ally, leads me to believe u lie like cheap chinese watch.