Arms DPS Rotations - Halp!

[HDawg187]

I have decent enough raiding gear on my warrior (4 Valorous bonus) and although my arms spec isn't perfect (I don't have imp slam or imp HS), I feel that my DPS is lower than it should be.

I've read about the optimum arms priority and it shows as:

Rend > Execute> Overpower > Mortal Strike > Slam > HS to dump rage

I've been following this and doing it pretty closely and I've been sitting around the 3k DPS mark for a full Naxx 25 run.

I always open with charge, rend, then follow the priority.

What I need is answers to some specific questions. I'd be very grateful if somebody could help me out here.

1. Should I use bladestorm every single time it's off cooldown?
2. Should I use recklessness every time it's off cooldown? If not, when should I use it?
3. Should I change my rotation for mobs that will die within 8 seconds?
4. When I charge in to DPS a big group and I don't have bladestorm up, what should I do? I have no idea about group rotation as arms. This is my biggest downfall as far as DPS loss goes.
5. Execute. When should I use it? Every time Sudden Death procs, I use it.. fair enough. What about when a boss gets into execute health range? I find myself executing then having no rage for a second or two.
6. A sweeping strikes question. say I use SS and I'm fighting 2 mobs. If I white hit my target, does it damage the other target too? Or does SS only proc off yellow attacks? Or does it work another way?

Thanks very much in advance.

[carnifex266]

I don't have imp slam

well there's your problem

[HDawg187]

Thanks, I'll add imp slam tonight. The reason I didn't have it is because I use arms as my PvP spec. My other spec is prot.

I think I'll probably just go for 2 different arms specs instead. WTB triple spec.

Anyway, in light of your well-written, in-depth, comprehensive feedback, can you offer any advice regarding group rotations or maybe answering any of the other questions I asked?

[Fonze]

Okay, lets see.. Spec for imp slam, download poweraura add Taste for Blood and Sudden Death so easily see when your OP and Exe proc is up.

Regarding group rotation, charge in get redn up pop SS and start with your Taste for Blood proc and use MS - slam etc etc
Also I find cleave a great option if SS is on cd while fighting several mobs.

Could probably write alot more, but havent slept the last 48 hours.. Time to go get some sleep now:=)

[Durenek]

Theres not much you can do on aoe trash packs as an arms warrior if your bladestorm isnt up regardless of rotation. If your running naxx, aoe trash shouldn't warrant a different rotation. Pop, bladestorm when its up, sweeping strikes when your out of bladestorm, and if you feel like it pop into zerker and throw out a ww. If aoe trash is really getting to you, you might want to look into picking up the cleave glyph which'll let you hit three targets with cleave. Apart from that, you rotation seems pretty spot on to me, warriors are pretty gear dependant, so as you start picking up t8, you should see your dps start to pick up.

[Aarcani]

Checking your dps for a full night is not a good way to judge your dps because it includes trash groups which are too short to give numbers that mean anything. Check your dps on patchwerk to see what your numbers are with no movement and avoidance variables involved.

[Marty]

The rotation is okay, I charge in, Rend, Execute/Overpower when they're available and fill the rest with Slam and Mortal Strike when I can miss the rage.
Improved Slam is a must. It will do alot of damage and you 'll be autohitting between the Slams, so you can keep spamming it.

The spec I use is http://eu.wowarmory.com/character-ta...=Marty&group=1 it shows I've got imp HS, but I hardly use it.
In a full Naxx25 run I'm doing 4-4.5k dps overall.

I'll try to answer your questions;
1. Bladestorm can do some nice damage, when it is off cooldown you should wait for Taste for Blood to tick, use Overpower, then Bladestorm. (Bladestorm takes 6 seconds, when it ends you can use Overpower again. This way you can use all your Taste for Blood ticks).
2. I hardly use Recklessness, might be bad, but I prefer to stay in Battle Stance (10% armor pen/no rage loss cus of stance dancing).
3. For mobs that die fast, like trash, I'd charge in, rend, Sweeping Strikes and spam Mortal Strike/Slam/Overpower as those can do fairly high damage and you will do it to two mobs. If you meant something else with mobs that die within 8 seconds, reply.
4. If you don't have Bladestorm up, I'd pop Sweeping Strikes and do the same as above. If you haven't got Sweeping Strikes either, I'd just Rend and Cleave/Overpower when you can.
5. Every time Sudden Death procs you should use it. When a boss gets to 20%, I keep Rend on him (untill he dies). You can throw in an Overpower very easy, due the low rage requirement, and just spam Execute when you can.
6. Sweeping Strikes does damage the other target with white damage, therefor you should pop stuff like Slam/Mortal Strike, so you don't waste your Sweeping Strikes with white hits. Also, Sweeping Strikes doesn't lose charges when there aren't second mobs to hit.

Hope it helped you a bit.

/Marty

[Avestheman]

I've read about the optimum arms priority and it shows as:

Rend > Execute> Overpower > Mortal Strike > Slam > HS to dump rage

I've been following this and doing it pretty closely and I've been sitting around the 3k DPS mark for a full Naxx 25 run.

I always open with charge, rend, then follow the priority.

What I need is answers to some specific questions. I'd be very grateful if somebody could help me out here.

1. Should I use bladestorm every single time it's off cooldown?
2. Should I use recklessness every time it's off cooldown? If not, when should I use it?
3. Should I change my rotation for mobs that will die within 8 seconds?
4. When I charge in to DPS a big group and I don't have bladestorm up, what should I do? I have no idea about group rotation as arms. This is my biggest downfall as far as DPS loss goes.
5. Execute. When should I use it? Every time Sudden Death procs, I use it.. fair enough. What about when a boss gets into execute health range? I find myself executing then having no rage for a second or two.
6. A sweeping strikes question. say I use SS and I'm fighting 2 mobs. If I white hit my target, does it damage the other target too? Or does SS only proc off yellow attacks? Or does it work another way?

Thanks very much in advance.

This is my raid spec. http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?warr...&version=10048
Use this or something similar.

Don't get caught up 100% in your DPS b/c an arms warrior brings a lot more to the table. (demo shout, thunder clap debuff, commanding shout, sunder armor, shattering throw, bloodfrenzy etc.) But since DPS is your concern that's what I will address.

Always keep rend up. I suggest Glyphing into it to free up some GCD's. Use execute and overpower whenever they proc. Try to keep MS on cool down. and only after those are all on CD do you spam IMPROVED slam. Don't worry about Heroic Strike just yet. Get your rotation down set so it's second nature, then start playing around with it. b/c a mistimed HS can rage starve you for 3+ seconds leaving you with just ur d**k in your hands.

As for particulars to boost your DPS, know when heroism will be used. Try to time it so that bladestorm is either saved for it, or so that you can use it early and have it back up for Hero. In addition, a nice shattering throw on the boss right b4 hero is a great way to boots RAID DPS.

Recklessness is a little tricky b/c you don't want to blow all your rage switching stances. There are some fights where I don't sure it, and some where I make SURE I use it. Any time there is an "area buff" like Malygos sparks or when you're fully clustered on Thaddius, burn your rage down productively and then switch to it. a short string of 20-35k crits will more than make up for the stance dancing. (switch back to arms b4 you use ur "guaranteed crit" attacks so you can quickly build your rage back up.)

As for grouped clusters, this is where your imp demo shout and thunderclap will make you more useful as a raid member and put you in the back seat as a DPSer. Ret Pallys, Mages, DKs, Warlocks, Balance Droods... they have AoE that you cannot match. So don't fret about it. Thunder clap, sweeping strikes. Don't even bother with bladestorm unless you KNOW you'll have it up by the time you really need it.

I hope that some of these tips help. Remember, you can be a very valued raid member w/o always being #1 on the DPS charts. The good raiders and raid leaders will will recognize the little things that you're doing.

[Partyraiser]

This is my raid spec. http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?warr...&version=10048
Use this or something similar.

Don't get caught up 100% in your DPS b/c an arms warrior brings a lot more to the table. (demo shout, thunder clap debuff, commanding shout, sunder armor, shattering throw, bloodfrenzy etc.) But since DPS is your concern that's what I will address.

Always keep rend up. I suggest Glyphing into it to free up some GCD's. Use execute and overpower whenever they proc. Try to keep MS on cool down. and only after those are all on CD do you spam IMPROVED slam. Don't worry about Heroic Strike just yet. Get your rotation down set so it's second nature, then start playing around with it. b/c a mistimed HS can rage starve you for 3+ seconds leaving you with just ur d**k in your hands.

As for particulars to boost your DPS, know when heroism will be used. Try to time it so that bladestorm is either saved for it, or so that you can use it early and have it back up for Hero. In addition, a nice shattering throw on the boss right b4 hero is a great way to boots RAID DPS.

Recklessness is a little tricky b/c you don't want to blow all your rage switching stances. There are some fights where I don't sure it, and some where I make SURE I use it. Any time there is an "area buff" like Malygos sparks or when you're fully clustered on Thaddius, burn your rage down productively and then switch to it. a short string of 20-35k crits will more than make up for the stance dancing. (switch back to arms b4 you use ur "guaranteed crit" attacks so you can quickly build your rage back up.)

As for grouped clusters, this is where your imp demo shout and thunderclap will make you more useful as a raid member and put you in the back seat as a DPSer. Ret Pallys, Mages, DKs, Warlocks, Balance Droods... they have AoE that you cannot match. So don't fret about it. Thunder clap, sweeping strikes. Don't even bother with bladestorm unless you KNOW you'll have it up by the time you really need it.

I hope that some of these tips help. Remember, you can be a very valued raid member w/o always being #1 on the DPS charts. The good raiders and raid leaders will will recognize the little things that you're doing.

Wow.
Thanks a lot, mate!
This is really, really helpfull and I'm sure the OP and many other people will be helped with your post!
Keep it up!

[Baabinator]

And to what i've heard, don't use heroic strike. It will decay your rage more then the damage it grants you.

[Parietis]

And to what i've heard, don't use heroic strike. It will decay your rage more then the damage it grants you.

Correction; Slam is your main rage dump and you should be using it the most, but if you're swimming in tons of excess rage (75-80+), start throwing in a few Heroic Strikes.

[HDawg187]

Thanks very much for all the brilliant replies. I really appreciate it. I still have a couple of bits of PvP gear which I need to swap with PvE gear to maximise my damage. I changed to imp slam and swapped another couple of things around. I'm sitting around the 4k mark which isn't too bad.

I suppose the warrior role is more about utility to the rest of the raid DPS rather than just worrying about my own.

I kept 5 x Sunder up throughout boss fights because I was the only warrior in Ulduar 25 at the time.

I also read something today that might be of use to budding warriors that need some advice. Try to use shattering throw at the same time as Bloodlust/Heroism. The -20% armour debuff stacks with sunder so it's a big dps increase for the raid overall.

Also, I thought I'd post this little gem I found on my guild forums. It's definitely got a good few tips in.

Posted by Asio/Deathbyday

Rule 1) Bladestorm, as most people i've heroiced with know, i like bladestorm. It is your main damage move and should be used on every CD, especially on multi mob pulls. However, Charge - Bladestorm isn't a good idea, because unless god is tanking you WILL get aggro on atleast 1 mob, until it's taunted back to the tank, the tank will not like you for doing this.

Rule 2) Sweeping strikes, Sweeping strikes is also very helpful on multi mob pulls, it is obviously heroically useless on single target pulls, but it's fantastic for pulls, i generally use this after bladestorm. It can be a good idea to pool up to 100 rage before hitting Sweeping Strikes. So you can use a Mortal strike, and a few slams instead of white attacks to use up the SS charges (as they do more damage than white attacks)

Rule 3) Mortal strike, Mortal strike is a good move, it's instant, does nothing to your swing timer. However, it is not as rage effecient as Slam, but it does more damage.

Rule 4) Execute, Execute through sudden death procs should be the move you prioritise above all else. The reason being Execute is the second rage effecient move, the main reason you should prioritise it above everything is that Execute can also proc sudden death, which allows you to execute again, so, execute as soon as you can.

Rule 5) Rend/Overpower. Rend should be up constantly, it should be the first move you hit after you've charged. The reason being every 2nd tick of Rend will proc Taste for Blood, TFB means you can overpower. Overpower should have a nearly 100% crit rate with talents, which means a (theoretical) 100% up time on Deep Wounds. Overpower is amazingly rage effecient, on the off chance you don't crit it's still 5 (five!!!!) rage for around 2K damage, around 5K crits mean an almost 1000:1 effeciency.

Rule 6) Sunder armor. If there is not a warrior tank in the raid, then keeping 5 stacks of sunder up on bosses is a must. Hitting a training dummy, for Just me doing damage, i start doing more damage after about a minute (the rage cost at the start vs overall damage)

Rule 7) That last 20%. So, the boss is at 20%, you have hundreds of options of what to do here, i've found that the best thing to do is go to zerker stance, pop Recklessness, switch back to Battle, then Crit 3 Executes in a row. then after that, keep Rend up, Overpower on TfB procs, and Execute every other bit of rage you have while keeping up 5 sunders.

Rule 8 ) Slam, Slam has been heavily modified over what it used to be, using Slam will no longer reset your swing timer, what it does is delays your swing timer by 0.5 seconds. Slam is more rage effecient that Mortal strike, but should only be used if Nothing else is available (rend is ticking, no Execute/OP proc, MS on CD)

[smartAXE]

rage rotation
use overpower every TfB, its cheap and does good dmg per pt of rage
if you can "spam" slam and OP and still stay around 100 rage constantly, add ms---slam does the most dmg per point of rage
^^^ if you can do all that and stay around 100 rage constantly, add SD procs

[Avestheman]

rage rotation
use overpower every TfB, its cheap and does good dmg per pt of rage
if you can "spam" slam and OP and still stay around 100 rage constantly, add ms---slam does the most dmg per point of rage
^^^ if you can do all that and stay around 100 rage constantly, add SD procs

ignore this ^ ^

if you're having rage troubles as arms ur doing something wrong. As i stated above priority of moves = Execute Proc, Over Power proc, MS, slam... and way down the line if you're at 100 rage Heroic Strike.