Balanced Druid lookin for advice (dps/damage)

[Richardhead]

Posts like this go up all the time. I'm completely stuck on my current dps/damage issue and i'm hoping that someone can assist me.

I do only run 10man content (10 Ony, 10 Toc and 10Uld-Hardmodes up to Freya atm-)
im at 268 hit and if you review my gear http://www.wowarmory.com/character-s...&n=Richardhead you'll see that my current gear set up is rather damn good.
with that said i do have some things from 25 ToC and the crafted bracer, chest, belt and boots.

Now keep in mind in my 10man we have i believe all buffs.

my rotation is: IFF 3/3 (up the entire fight), IIS 3/3, glyphed (100% up time), IMF 1/2 glyphed (100% uptime)
NO MANA ISSUES then i spam out Wrath till eclipse then switch to Starfire.... i stay spamming Starfire untill i see the other Eclipse then spam Wrath ands stay spamming wrath till i see eclpise again then back to starfire...... over and over and over....

am i missing something here.. i mean i do good dps, but based on my gear score, gear, rotation, spec and watching the Ele Sham, Loc and Mage ( i understand that are gonna roll my dps) i just feel like im missing something...

Ive been playing this class/spec forever and i just feel left out of the pwnage party.

[ZidjiN]

Your rotaions sounds fine. The only thing that comes to mind is starfall and treant's, you didnt say that you use em but i guess you do.
Your spec doesnt have Celestial focus, you could move your points from intensity to Celestial focus. If you have enough mana / regen that is.

How much DPS do you push?

[Fonzey]

Drop some Mana Regen Talents and/or Gale Winds in favour for maxing out Imp MF (scales nicely with 2pc T9) and also 3/3 Celestial Focus.

You also want to pickup a second piece of Tier 8.5 so that you can run with both 2pc t8 and 2pc t9.

2pc t8 is still ridiculously good, you want to hang onto that for now.

Other than that, download/install an addon called WiseEclipse. That will cancel your Lunar Eclipse whilst you're casting the final Starfire, which will allow it to proc your Solar Eclipse whilst the SF is still under the critical strike buff from Lunar. Essentially it halves your Eclipse downtime.

What numbers are you putting out, for the record?

[Richardhead]

yeah i send trents upon BL on the "boss".. starfall goes on normal times when its wise to use it..

dps on a stand and cast fight its 4.9-5.1 moving fights its 3.8-4-5ish.

[FourofaKind]

dps on a stand and cast fight its 4.9-5.1 moving fights its 3.8-4-5ish.

Congratulations Richard, you are the first person to ever post a non-metered DPS number and not be a total lier. I respect you ALOT for this.

Now, onto your DPS, Def take CF, 3% haste is 3% damage, not bad for 3 points. Grab the Spell Hit ring out of HTOC 5 (unless you can get better) and a new neck (Kologarn 10) so that you can drop the Hit enchants/Gems (especially your JC specific gem, turn that shit to spellpower asap bro!) you might also want to consider the Halfcast gem, I've noticed its been very impressive for me during my test runs with it. Grab a reckless if you need the "yellow" gem. Def Drop intensity, its at most giving you around 80-100MP5 and those points are better spent elsewhere. I would drop moonglow and put the point into Imp Fire and 1 into genesis. (moonglow saves you AT MOST 200 mana off of starfall, its pretty shitty.) You like IIS so I guess you should keep it, but I learned it makes you want to screw up your Eclipse rotation more (espeically since you listed you have 100% uptime with both dots... either RNG hates you or you care more about a DoT then 45% damage on Wrath or an "autocrit" Starfire.) If you change your mind, I recommend Typhoon and 2 OF. Other then that, make sure you are as buffed as everyone else, and keep your rotation strong and you should notice that you will be catching up to the other DPSers in your raid (especially at that level, you should be ahead of them, unless they dramatically outgear you). But do remember, you are a hybrid class, being 4th on a 10 man meter or 7-13th on a 25man meter is not the end of the world, it just means your other raiders are doing there part and you are pulling the expected numbers. (Unless your raid and you suck, then you have things to worry about, but 5.1k dps in your gear isnt terrible at all (just 1k shy of MAX potential, and most players sit around around 7-500 short and even the best sit at a good 200 short of max)

Keep up the good work!

[Richardhead]

am i dealing with the IS/ MF wrong?
i understood it as keeping them up assit with procs for Eclipses and Idol.

should i NOT be keeping them up 100% of the time?

and its easy to keep up.. i use squawk and awe addon to manage the proc/ timers..

lastly are there better addons for this?

[Zth]

am i dealing with the IS/ MF wrong?
i understood it as keeping them up assit with procs for Eclipses and Idol.

should i NOT be keeping them up 100% of the time?

and its easy to keep up.. i use squawk and awe addon to manage the proc/ timers..

lastly are there better addons for this?

I found ForteX to be really helpful to keep count of timers/dots, and I made a PowerAuras timer for both moonfire and insect swarm to pop on the screen. Squawk and Awe isn't really helpful since 3.2.

I got to suggest you another addon called WiseEclipse. If you don't have it yet, get it, it boosted my dps by about 200-300. You can get it here: http://www.wowinterface.com/download...seEclipse.html

I'm not gonna explain you what it does, I'm not good with words Read the description on the website

[Deleted]

I just wanted to pop in a quick reply, during a runback in raid:

You have 600 haste. Thats 200 haste that could have gone to crit. Haste is still usefull after 400, but not as much as crit is. Imagine how useless that haste is on your wraths, and that you are only benefitting from it when you are casting starfire. You could have 4-5 or even more crit, if you ditched that extra haste, and that would be a massive increase in your damage.

[FourofaKind]

am i dealing with the IS/ MF wrong?
i understood it as keeping them up assit with procs for Eclipses and Idol.

should i NOT be keeping them up 100% of the time?

If keeping your dots up 100% of the time means missing out on a Wrath/Starfire Cast during its respective eclipse, then yes you should not be doing this.

Once you see that blue moon, you hit starfire till it goes away, same with Orange Moon and Wrath. The only reason you arent casting either of those spells during their specific time (Eclipse) is because you have to move or the boss is immune.

[Richardhead]

......updated......

my spec has been tweeked.. a few gems replaced and a ring replaced.

haste dropped some crit up some....

and im woring to better understand the eclipse proc...
since i always kept ISS/IMF up all the time. i'm messing with the rotation.

now i have a +90agi greatness from a Kitty set i dont play much.

for added crit do you think the Broodmother and the +90agi Greatness card are a good or HORRIBLE idea?

[Fonzey]

......updated......

my spec has been tweeked.. a few gems replaced and a ring replaced.

haste dropped some crit up some....

and im woring to better understand the eclipse proc...
since i always kept ISS/IMF up all the time. i'm messing with the rotation.

now i have a +90agi greatness from a Kitty set i dont play much.

for added crit do you think the Broodmother and the +90agi Greatness card are a good or HORRIBLE idea?

Horrible! Agility does nothing for a caster, so don't equip that kitty trinket.

If you're good for haste, Broodmother / Sundial would be a nice combo to stack crit - but if you've got access to Illustration from OS25 or Reign of the Dead from Anub25, then they would be the best choices to accompany Broodmother, as raw SP > all.

As for refreshing DoTs, I personally refresh DoTs even during Eclipse. The only time I do not refresh DoTs during eclipse is if it can make the difference between an extra SF/Wrath or not. Always take the extra nuke over a DoT refresh.

The DoT refreshment issue is always under heavy discussion over at EJ, but the current verdict is that the difference is negligable either way, since when geared correctly we spend minimal time outside of Eclipse anyway - so 'wasting' proc time to refresh DoTs is not the issue it used to be.

The only thing I'll comment on about your new spec, is mana efficiency / regen. You've nerfed yourself alot with these changes - and even though you had no problems before, you may start to struggle on fights where you happen to give away your innervate. IF that is the case, dropping to 1/3 Moonglow and picking up 2/3 Intensity will be more regen for you, but if Mana still isn't an issue for you - leave your spec alone

[Deleted]

The only time I refresh dots is when A) I have downtime and no eclipse up or B) I cannot get another cast off on that eclipse. Which means the dots are still up the majority of the fight but do not affect my casting eclipse

[Fonzey]

The only time I refresh dots is when A) I have downtime and no eclipse up or B) I cannot get another cast off on that eclipse. Which means the dots are still up the majority of the fight but do not affect my casting eclipse

Insect Swarm, Moonfire, Starfall and Treants all award MORE Damage per Execution time than an Eclipsed SF or Wrath would, so don't be afraid of eating into eclipse time to refresh DoTs or pop cooldowns

[Octaviel]

First post ever on this forum, but I just felt it was time to finally participate in discussions rather than just reading em for a change.

I have been raiding most of wotlk now as a Balance druid, and I think were able to top meters clearly, but after the last changes to nature's grace I think crit became a stat we really have to take more serious now that haste mostly is capped when you crit.

My character: http://armory.wow-europe.com/charact...ood&n=Octaviel

I have been very satisfied with this spec, and my gear im currently quite happy about, it works for me, the only issue I have atm is that if I am in a raid lacking Totem of Wrath and/or Focus Magic, my dps might often suffer quite alot, sometimes even 1k due to RNG. I do however with both of these buffs in a good setup (not lacking BoK or spirit buff) able to stay in the guild top 3 usually, and on short nukage fights like OS 3drake zerg I have been able to push over 7k and other times around 6.6k, but this always vary abit, its never set in stone.
As for the guild, I do consider alot of the people ive raided with as great competative dpsers, some of them are quite skilled so when I match their dps, do abit less or abit more I generally feel I did a good job.

Currently raiding with 2set tier 9.2 and 2set tier 8.5, so my setup is based abit on that.
However here is how I prioritize; I always keep Moonfire up, asmuch as possible, IS however I dont bother to re-apply unless im in a solar eclipse or between eclipses wich also happens at times (remember its RNG), and I never bother to re-apply it during a lunar eclipse. IFF is always up, I apply it at the start and make sure i re-apply if the fight takes so long it runs out.
Keeping moonfire up is important, as this grants me crit from my relic and gives Starfire more crit aswell plus ive glyped for it too. Then its just the usual rotation really, and I do use starfall and force of nature as often as I can, and often as early as I can so I have them up again later in the fight if possible.
Typhoon in my opinion is a pvp spell, and its by no means mandatory or needed to do good dps in a raid. Its ment as a getaway function in pvp the way I see it, and I only take it for pvp purposes, however there are fights where it can be nice to have it, but those are limited. Gale Winds talent I do not spend points in as it boosts two pvp spells, and the dmg loss on Hurricane I can live with.
One talent I find quite worth mentioning is Owlkin Frenzy, I find the 1 point I spent in it back when I finally were able to move out of the pvp hit talenter was a good investment. With the amount of raid damage in alot of fights I manage to get it proced often, wich can sometimes be golden if its right after a trinket proc and in a eclipse for example, so definatly worth having a point in.

Generally I think people in this thread has provided with many great comments and suggestions, and remember, even if druids are a hybrid class we are able to be amongst the top in both our dps specs, but as always, some fights arent as optimal as others, especially if its too much swapping of targets, or alot of movement involved.

Lastly I would like to point out that when it comes down to the dots, and refreshing them, I have to say I often feel my dps drop if I re-apply IS during lunar eclipse. I used to re-apply it when I had 4set tier 8.5 as the 4set bonus was really awsome and helpful to proc solar eclipses faster, but when I lost that bonus I only prio Moonfire high, leaving IS out as ive pointed out earlier in this post. Also when it comes to adds in bossfights I often find dps dropping too if I go to extreme lengths doting up everything and applying with IFF on them. Often adds die so fast that 1 moonfire and then wrath or starfire (depending on what eclipse you might be in) is a better choice than getting up full debuffs on targets. This however can be left for a totally different discussion alltogether, and might be very random from fight to fight.

Hope something I said was of use to anyone.

Plurr.

Octaviel
Grove of Eternal Balance
Defias Brotherhood EU

[FourofaKind]

Insect Swarm, Moonfire, Starfall and Treants all award MORE Damage per Execution time than an Eclipsed SF or Wrath would, so don't be afraid of eating into eclipse time to refresh DoTs or pop cooldowns

Even with insane haste, reapplying dots and activating abilities such as FoN and Starfall during your eclipse will still hurt your overall DPS. They would not if the GCD did not exist. For instance -> Starfire (Crits) for XXXXX Damage <Solar Eclipse> -> Wrath -> Wrath -> IS -> MF -> SFALL -> FoN -> Wrath -> Wrath hurts more then straight Wrathing till end of eclipse and THEN applying said formula. As far as your mana regen is concerned, crit often, use innervates properly and the only real exception to the Eclipse rule is popping starfall on OOC procs (it helps, alot)

[Fonzey]

Even with insane haste, reapplying dots and activating abilities such as FoN and Starfall during your eclipse will still hurt your overall DPS. They would not if the GCD did not exist. For instance -> Starfire (Crits) for XXXXX Damage <Solar Eclipse> -> Wrath -> Wrath -> IS -> MF -> SFALL -> FoN -> Wrath -> Wrath hurts more then straight Wrathing till end of eclipse and THEN applying said formula. As far as your mana regen is concerned, crit often, use innervates properly and the only real exception to the Eclipse rule is popping starfall on OOC procs (it helps, alot)

What has made you come to that conclusion?

Using the WrathCalcs spreadsheet, It turns out that I would need 1750 critical strike rating for Wrath under Eclipse to outdamage an IS cast.

For Starfire under eclipse to out damage an IS cast, I would require 1250 haste rating.

Neither 1750 critical strike rating nor 1250 haste rating are realistic figures at our current level of gear progression, so IS and MF will always be a better use of a GCD than Wrath of Starfire, even during Eclipse.

The one exception is if it's the final Starfire of a Lunar Eclipse, as to maximise on WiseEclipse you'd want to skip out on refreshing any DoTs at that particular time.

The figures I refer to are Damage Per Execution Time as per the second tab of the WrathCalcs DPS spreadsheet.

[FourofaKind]

What has made you come to that conclusion?

Using the WrathCalcs spreadsheet, It turns out that I would need 1750 critical strike rating for Wrath under Eclipse to outdamage an IS cast.

For Starfire under eclipse to out damage an IS cast, I would require 1250 haste rating.

Neither 1750 critical strike rating nor 1250 haste rating are realistic figures at our current level of gear progression, so IS and MF will always be a better use of a GCD than Wrath of Starfire, even during Eclipse.

The one exception is if it's the final Starfire of a Lunar Eclipse, as to maximise on WiseEclipse you'd want to skip out on refreshing any DoTs at that particular time.

The figures I refer to are Damage Per Execution Time as per the second tab of the WrathCalcs DPS spreadsheet.

First off, there seems to be some confusion... Are you talking about refreshing ALL of your dots/activating cooldown abilities during the same eclipse, or just 1 per eclipse (I.E Refresh IS during Solar OR Moonfire during Lunar)

Secondly, Wrathcalc is great, but you might be misreading it. Yes IS may "out Damage" wrath (for example, IS Damage would be 14k over 14 seconds and wrath = 7k average (Crits and Hits) thus providing IS to have a higher DPM then Wrath, (especially due to mana costs)) but it does not out DPS wrath, I don't think you are here to make that arguement, same with Moonfire vs Starfire, in terms of straight DPS, Starfire crushes Moonfire. What you may want to consider is the DPS/DPM loss by not casting that wrath/starfire during its respective eclipse vs waiting to refresh the dots. At base face value, the amount is miniscule and human error/Dice rolls would permit the DoTs over the Casts as DoTs are, not argueably, far more reliable. What you should also consider is over the extended period of either the boss fights or the raid in general that the amount becomes more and more significant (I think AT THE VERY BEST its a 20% loss of DPS to ensure 100%DoT Uptime, the 20% is figured AFTER the difference of DPS for 100% uptime vs AT THE VERY WORST 60% uptime. ) and therefor Casts should be at a higher priority then DoTs.

Your 1750 Crit 1250 Haste values are to completely invalidate the dots as opposed to under-prioritizing them. I'm not saying don't use the dots (especially moonfire), I'm just saying that placing them at the top of your priority list seems a bit detrimental. We aren't Affliction/Shadowpriests, our nukes are tastier then our dots. 45% more damage on 10 wraths beats 10 additional IS ticks(NOT CASTS), as does 45% higher crit chance on starfire (a good 10 crits @ 5-7kdps pending spellpower) vs 8-10 (hell even 14 critical) moonfire ticks (The burst damage from Moonfire is minimal and will be applied no matter when the spell is cast).

Look at it over the course of a fight, if I have a 5 min fight (big number I know) meaning I have 300 seconds of combat about 150 of those will be in eclipse, use the interval seconds as times to apply your dots (that gives you about 20applications of each) and keep your 150 seconds of Eclipse (10 procs in a 5 min fight) for Wrath and starfire. best bet is the 20 second rule, especailly for Moonfire, and yes I know the new eclipse KINDA fucks up that rule...

[Fonzey]

I'm talking about replacing A nuke cast during the relevant eclipse with refreshing A DoT (whatever has expired).

The numbers provided by WrathCalcs represent the Damage gained in exchange for the Execution time spent casting it.

Wrathcalcs provides the following information: (obviously specific to the stats plugged into my spreadsheet right now)

Wrath: 5442.49
Wrath under Eclipse: 7668.96
Wrath under Insect Swarm: 5605.76
Wrath under Eclipse, Insect Swarm: 7899.03
Starfire: 5512.86
Starfire under Eclipse: 7503.24
Starfire under Moonfire: 5652.34
Starfire under Eclipse, Moonfire: 7612.65
Moonfire: 11634.14
Moonfire, 3 Starfire casts: 18315.03
Insect Swarm: 8903.53

As you can see, the ranking order is as follows:

Moonfire (with three SF refreshers) > Moonfire > Insect Swarm > Eclipsed Wrath > Eclipsed SF

The only way to re-arrange this rank is to increase Haste and/or Crit to the unrealistic figures posted earlier.

These numbers would suggest that our nukes are not as you said "tastier than our dots" - but are merely fillers.

The fact that SF/Wrath makes up of most of our damage done is irrelevant in this case, DoTs still should take priority, take a look at an affliction warlocks logs - shadowbolt will be their biggest contributor but DoTs always take priority because they're worth more to the GCD consumed than a shadowbolt.

When all is said and done though, the difference is minimal if you look at a moonkin who refreshes during eclipse, and a moonkin that waits till downtime - but my numbers suggest a marginal favour to maximising uptime regardless of eclipse. If you chose to ignore these numbers and play with what feels right to you - then who am I to stop you, but I'm trying to answer Richards question as accurately as possible

[FourofaKind]

Wrath: 5442.49
Wrath under Eclipse: 7668.96
Wrath under Insect Swarm: 5605.76
Wrath under Eclipse, Insect Swarm: 7899.03
Starfire: 5512.86
Starfire under Eclipse: 7503.24
Starfire under Moonfire: 5652.34
Starfire under Eclipse, Moonfire: 7612.65
Moonfire: 11634.14
Moonfire, 3 Starfire casts: 18315.03
Insect Swarm: 8903.53

...

These numbers would suggest that our nukes are not as you said "tastier than our dots" - but are merely fillers.

Insect Swarm 8903.53/14 seconds = 636 dps

Moonfire 18315.03 / 24 = 763 dps

Wrath under eclipse 7668/1.2 (tell me how much haste you have base plz its probably less the this aka closer to /1(.1) = 6390 DPS

Starfire under eclipse 7503.24/2.4 (again with proper haste more likely <2(.2) = 3126.25

763 dps > 3124.25 ?!?!

6390 dps < 636 !?!?!?!?!?!

I don't think the dots are Tastier, also, IF you have ISS (idk why) you are only gaining 192 DPS on Wrath and 48 dps on Starfire sooooooo basically you are saying it is worth it to trade 1 second of 6390 dps for 828 dps (1 second of IS dps and IIS bonus) or second of 3124.25 dps for 811 dps (1 second of moonfire DPS plus IIS bonus)

I still think 100% uptime is not worth the tradeoff, the numbers may seem big at face, but remember in 5 min testcase you only assume halftime of Eclipse so take the averages(differences) down by at least 1/2... Overall you are looking at a ~12% incr total damage/dps by focusing Eclipse instead of 100% uptime. Warlocks and Shadowpriests operate differently then we do, I already mentioned that.

[Richardhead]

Fonzey good call... that was perhaps the most retated thing i've thought of in forever (playing with that card) i have absolutly no idea what i was thinking at the time i posted that question. i was just replacing stuff and trying to get more crit on my self asap. good call.

also good information guys helped alot. i got to 2nd on dps and 2nd on overall damage done on Hardmodes Hodir, Mim and Freya.

i focused on wrathing out to a eclipse then starfiring it out.. yadda yadda then refreshing the IIS/IMF on the start of the global cool down from Eclipse... up time of around 70-75% if i had to guess with no spreadsheet work on the 2 Dots