[Cat] Mihir's "Fix my Feral DPS Gear" thread'

[shift43]

Yes, banner of victory is currently my other trinket, which brings me up to 1393 passive armor pen.

I'm holding off on my 3rd dragons eye for when I get a new trinket, and when that happens, I will use my dragons eye and replace 2 orange gems with armor pen and use hearty rhino to remain capped (1403 armor pen total). I'm already at the expertise soft cap and hit capped with a Draenei in my group.

With my crit being a little lower than I like, I'm debating to either hold out for a whispering fang trinket, or buy the war token now...thoughts?

I suggest the belt instead of the trinket, wait for fanged skull. the badge belt has more arp than your current belt, honestly i think they really messed up the itemization when they made the one off putricide 25. Its an Arp belt without the Arp.

I suggest you change your belt and a few gems to look like this:
pants to [arp][stats]+6agi
belt to *vengeful noose* [arp][arp][DE-arp]no bonus
feet to [arp][arp]no bonus, gloves to [arp][DE-arp]

From this you gain 90 arp & 64 haste (TRINKET SLOT), while losing 32 agi, 32 arp, 110 crit.
Putting DV in that trinket slot gets you way ahead of where banner had you even with the stats lost with re-gemming. Deaths Verdict can be bought in a gdkp run (best when done on high pop servers), go for a couple weeks getting gold then go to buy DV.

You mentioned that your crit is lower than you want, you are really noticing the loss of ~140 agi from a weapon by using a strength weapon. Hersir's Greatspear in 10man heroic is an excellent weapon and I cant wait to get it myself to replace my Lupine Longstaff. you will drop a bit of crit making the gear changes but DV can make your crit seem better.
Also, you could opt to keep BoV and use 34 agi DE gems, 2x[DE-agi] 1x[agi]. Agility is much better than crit rating. Agi food is best when you don't need the arp from food, you could gem pure agi in 2 more sockets and use arp food since its easier to farm.

http://www.wowarmory.com/character-s...n=Stilluseclaw
^ that is my armory, im waiting on 10-heroic greatspear so I can use my 264 badge belt again (should get me around 100-200 arp).

[Anononon]

I suggest the belt instead of the trinket, wait for fanged skull. the badge belt has more arp than your current belt, honestly i think they really messed up the itemization when they made the one off putricide 25.

How do you figure that?

http://www.wowhead.com/?compare=50067;50995

I sit at about 62(ish)% crit raid buffed with no procs. Since I am both expertise(soft) capped and hit capped, my CRIT cap is 74% (white hits only). I have deathbringers will which has the chance to proc 600 agility, combined with Mongoose and Idol proc....I sit at roughly 73% crit. Therefore, getting Deaths Verdict is a DOWNgrade when pit against Banner for me right now (450/510 Agi proc would put me over Crit cap) and stats like Agility and Crit lose nearly half their DPS value after crit cap.

So your advise seems a bit contradicting, but I suppose it's my fault for not elaborating on what I meant on "Im not happy with my crit." (By The Way, 140 agility = 1.68% crit, my previous weapon was Heroic Lupine longstaff)

According to ToskksDPScalculator, Raid buffed my DPS Stat values are as follows:
Crit: 2.3134
Haste: 2.3637
Agility:2.7051
STR: 2.4016

Notice haste is slightly higher than crit per point value. That is only because I have so little haste as it is (114), BUT the more crit you get, the less dps value it receives eventually making haste value much higher(The less haste you have, the more valueable it is unless you cap both armor pen and crit first).

You say I should wait for whispering fang skull trinket OR get Deaths verdict while replacing my belt; I did fail to mention I am first in line to receive Oathbinder, Heroic distant land, Heroic bloodfall...whichever comes first, which will provide me with a minimum of 4% crit from swapping to the weapon, ALSO factoring in I do not have the toskk bracers yet (50 more crit rating, 50 less haste) pushing me closer to crit cap.

What I meant was, I am not happy with my CURRENT crit rating, so anticipating gear...I suppose I just answered my own question. Herkumi war token provides a bigger upgrade in the long run, as it will eventually pass Heroic WFS as well.

So in conclusion, I will be getting The war token to replace banner, and I will switch 2 orange gems with 20 armor pen, and throw in my 3rd dragons eye bumping me back up to 1363 armor pen (1403 with food).

[shift43]

You asked for advice and then completely ignored my reasoning and used your own invented reasoning to pick the answer you wanted to hear. Ignoring help that you ask for is a good way to get ignored on forums.
I was never rude to you yet you act like you know everything about feral and I was wrong in what I said.

Those procs you listed are not reliable to be crit capped, DBW is only 1/3 chance every 1.5minutes, mongoose isn't always active like you make it sound.

If you are worried about white crit capping, change your enchant to berserking/mongoose and remember that the listed changes after gems is 110 crit rating lost and gaining 90 arp from gear/gems. DV is listed as better than banner for me no matter what my current arp is changed to.

I did not contradict myself, agility is better than crit/haste and arp is better than agility when that close to cap. I gave you multiple options to get what you want/need, another druid mentioned a few similar steps. (regemming)

(i think i was gonna make a couple other comments but im insanely tired and forgot a few of the first ones i was going to write.

[Anononon]

I acknowledged everything you said...and stated nothing rude myself...there is no reason to be upset.

Forgive me, I meant no offense. I was just posting what I had found through research.

I am already capped with armor pen...and your reasoning for the belt being better was for more armor pen.

I would like to know your reasoning behind why waiting on whispering fang skull is better than getting the war token.

[Woven]

Hey. I've thrown all my stuff through Toskk's and SimCraft (never did like rawr much for some reason), and was wondering if there were any things you'd suggest fixing. I'm on a pretty limited gold budget as this is my offspec, hence the blue gems (1/4 the price for 80% the stats), and mongoose on the weap. All my frost as well for the next 180 or so emblems will be going towards resto gear so that's out. I have access to 10 ICC up to lk and 25 icc however far pugs go.

My armory is here. Thanks in advance

http://www.wowarmory.com/character-s...issan&cn=Woven

The other question I had was with rotation. How long can rip be down for after a 5CP FB before its a dps loss to have FB'd. And I believe I heard someone say getting your 3 shreds for glyph of shred is more important than rake uptime. Is this correct?

[Ellywelly]

I've been raiding as a feral cat for little over a year now, generally in that time I spent most my time being top 4/5 on the dmg for almost every boss. But lately my DPS has dropped dramatically when it should really be going up considering the gear upgrades I've been getting. I kind of noticed a drop really towards the end of the ToC content.

Heres a link to my armory; http://eu.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Shadowsong&cn=Ellywelly

[Exegesis]

Hello, MMO-C community. I need a little advice on how to best spend Frost emblems for my druid... armory should be http://www.wowarmory.com/character-feed.xml?r=Baelgun&cn=Linthanas if I've done the hyperlinking right.

At the moment, I'm pretty pleased with how the character is playing: I managed to crawl my way to 7.2k DPS on 25-man Saurfang a few nights back, and that was before (gemming and enchanting and) adding the Frostbitten Fur Boots to the equation. Not the optimum DPS that the simulators say I should be pulling, but I don't think it's bad for what I'm working with... of course, constructive disagreement on that will be readily welcome.

Anyways. I don't get to raid a lot due to work conflicts, so I'm trying to spend my precious Frost emblems as judiciously as possible. I'm torn between two trains of thought:

A) Replace the glaring weakness in my gear, which means upgrading the Meteorite Whetstone with a Herkuml War Token.

B) Start saving up for T10 pieces, and hope that I pick up a Whispering Fanged Skull or a Deathbringer's Will in one of the PuGs I manage to slide into. Or, barring that, just get off my lazy ass and buy a Greatness trinket once I've finished shelling out for the Saronite for some Bladeborne Leggings.

I'm assuming one of those two courses of action is the correct course, though if someone a little more experienced can glance at my Armory profile and see some other immediate need, I'm all ears. Eyes. Whatever. Thanks in advance.

[gardner]

Hello

This is my current gear setup http://eu.wowarmory.com/character-sh...onsus&cn=Damea and i must say im really pleased with it. I would like to replace my curent weapon with the 251 polearm from the bloodprinces which has ap,hit and armor penetration that way i could replace my hit gems,i would be a bit under the epertise cap but that shouldnt be a problem.As soon as i get my deathbringers will i want to switch to full armor penetration geming.Im really interested in your opinion Mihir and thanks for it in advance.

[Andanas]

I'd like some advice as well. Our 10man progression is up to Rotface, and 25 mans only started last week, and we are up to Saurfang, so that's what I have to work with right now, as well as badges.

I also know I'm over the ArPen cap. I forgot to include the food bonus.

Any advice would be appreciated.

http://www.wowarmory.com/character-s...ers&cn=Andanas

[Shindi]

I have no idea what would seem to be the probelm here... I used to do like alot dps but I went bear for few months and Now im doing about 5-7k dps

http://eu.wowarmory.com/character-sh...nas&n=lunandri

Yesterday I did 7,3k dps on saurfang without arms warrior or feral tank

is there somethin special Im doing wrong or am I just that bad? :-\

[Epoch]

I have no idea what would seem to be the probelm here... I used to do like alot dps but I went bear for few months and Now im doing about 5-7k dps

http://eu.wowarmory.com/character-sh...nas&n=lunandri

Yesterday I did 7,3k dps on saurfang without arms warrior or feral tank

is there somethin special Im doing wrong or am I just that bad? :-\

What's the rotation you are using? Give this a try - mangle, savage roar, rake, shred to 5cp rip --> repeat. The only thing i can come up with as to your gear is not having the 2 piece t8 bonus, which may hurt you in the end. Can you switch to 2t8 + 2t10 until 4t10?
*T8 2 piece: The periodic damage of your Rake and Rip abilities has a chance to cause you to enter a Clearcasting state.
(omfg yes free shreds!!!1one!)

As to your gems you are 2 arp off of softcap proc for NES, switch one of the agi gems with a arp gem to get closer to 722.

Do you have a http://www.wowhead.com/?item=44253 , http://www.wowhead.com/?item=40256 or a http://www.wowhead.com/?item=45931 ? If you can make up the arp loss of banner with gems i would almost say to swap dmc: greatness or any equal trinket in place of banner.

[Exegesis]

What's the rotation you are using? Give this a try - mangle, savage roar, rake, shred to 5cp rip --> repeat. The only thing i can come up with as to your gear is not having the 2 piece t8 bonus, which may hurt you in the end. Can you switch to 2t8 + 2t10 until 4t10?
*T8 2 piece: The periodic damage of your Rake and Rip abilities has a chance to cause you to enter a Clearcasting state.
(omfg yes free shreds!!!1one!)

As to your gems you are 2 arp off of softcap proc for NES, switch one of the agi gems with a arp gem to get closer to 722.

Do you have a http://www.wowhead.com/?item=44253 , http://www.wowhead.com/?item=40256 or a http://www.wowhead.com/?item=45931 ? If you can make up the arp loss of banner with gems i would almost say to swap dmc: greatness or any equal trinket in place of banner.

I hate to piggyback off your response to someone else, Epoch, but I'm curious about the T8 suggestion. Does the (obviously powerful) set bonus offset the stats that are lost from not equipping, say, two pieces of T9 instead? Now and again I'll read posts like yours that suggest so, but the T8 stuff never pops up in things like Rawr, so... colour me uncertain and looking for clarification.

[Epoch]

I hate to piggyback off your response to someone else, Epoch, but I'm curious about the T8 suggestion. Does the (obviously powerful) set bonus offset the stats that are lost from not equipping, say, two pieces of T9 instead? Now and again I'll read posts like yours that suggest so, but the T8 stuff never pops up in things like Rawr, so... colour me uncertain and looking for clarification.

np dude, i cant remember where someone broke down which pieces of t8 2 piece to use until 4 piece t10 but found the following in pask's cat dps thread -
http://www.mmo-champion.com/class-druid/feral-druids-the-cat-guide-3-2!-edition/

Yeah I'm gonna fix that. It was a single target only DPS spec (obviously) without a mangle or trauma source. It's what I always use to DPS say, the Heroic target dummy.

On the subject of T8 2 pc i think it's still being looked into although IMO it's phenomenal and whatever 2 peices you get you should take.

2pt8 is RIDICULOUS. I have literally gotten back-to-back-to-back-to-back clearcasts several times in a row to the point where people in vent have said my name to make sure I was still playing, what with 100 energy and all. Applying Rake seems to proc it as well, and there's no internal cooldown on it, so that 2% chance per bleed tic can go pretty far on a boss fight. It definitely stacks with Omen of Clarity in a good way.

I have the link to a thread saved in my favorites that showed which tier to use until 4p t10 if i can find it ill post it here. Used it myself for quite a while till i got 4 piece - worked really good.

Dont depend on rawr too much, it doesnt take into account a few things one of which is hardcap arp.

[chironos]

Here's a link to my armory:
http://www.wowarmory.com/character-s...er&cn=Chironos

I would appreciate it if you could 1. Take a look at my spec and 2. Take a look at my gemming. I know I'm getting into the range where ArP overtakes Agi in terms of DPS value. I'm sitting at 7644 AP, hit capped, 56.33% crit unbuffed in cat form. I'm curious if gemming for ArP instead of Agi would give me a DPS increase, or if getting rid of the agi gems at this point would cripple my dps by lowering my crit and making my rotation harder to maintain.

[Exegesis]

I have the link to a thread saved in my favorites that showed which tier to use until 4p t10 if i can find it ill post it here. Used it myself for quite a while till i got 4 piece - worked really good.

Dont depend on rawr too much, it doesnt take into account a few things one of which is hardcap arp.

Thank you very much, Epoch. Very intriguing response. I think I'll put some of those excess badges I have to replacing the two pieces of T9 I have with their T8 equivalents and see if the downgrade in stats are made up for by the extra Clearcasting procs. Hell, if it doesn't, all I'm out is some unused badges, right? Right. Thanks again, and if you find that thread with the specific suggestions on pieces, don't hesitate to link it.

[Paskgotsheal]

2pc t9 > 2pc t8

[Deleted]

By itself, 2T8 is > 2T9. 2T8 values at 200 dps, while 2T9 only at 175. However the difference in stats between 226 and 232 gear makes up for that. If you got the badges to spare, getting T8 chest/head would be a good investment over getting the nonset 245 pieces from triumph badges/LW. I doubt any guild is running ulduar anymore so I don't think any new player will get any T8 beyond those 2 pieces. If you only got access to badge gear, going 2T8+2T9 until you get enough badges to get 2T10 would probably be a good idea, I'll try to keep 2T8 in mind from now on tho

(discarded my T8 so long ago that I didnt really think about it :P)

[Shindi]

What's the rotation you are using? Give this a try - mangle, savage roar, rake, shred to 5cp rip --> repeat. The only thing i can come up with as to your gear is not having the 2 piece t8 bonus, which may hurt you in the end. Can you switch to 2t8 + 2t10 until 4t10?
*T8 2 piece: The periodic damage of your Rake and Rip abilities has a chance to cause you to enter a Clearcasting state.
(omfg yes free shreds!!!1one!)

As to your gems you are 2 arp off of softcap proc for NES, switch one of the agi gems with a arp gem to get closer to 722.

Do you have a http://www.wowhead.com/?item=44253 , http://www.wowhead.com/?item=40256 or a http://www.wowhead.com/?item=45931 ? If you can make up the arp loss of banner with gems i would almost say to swap dmc: greatness or any equal trinket in place of banner.

I start my fight with Pounce (obvioiusly) then I go Mangle SR Rake Shred shred 5point rip rake shred SR shred shred rake Rip and FB between the times I got all bleeds and SR up and 5cp but I dont use mangle if I have arms warrior or feral tank cause I dont think mangle is needed to use wonder if that has anything to do with it? and No I dont have any of trinkets above I was in toc 25man and Deaths verdict dropped and man I was like soo close on ninjaing it cause I wanted it xD

Also I'd like to thank you for responding to my comment

[Deleted]

Hi Mihr,

This chick is my alt and I only have access to 10 mans at the moment, although I pug the first four bosses in 25 man whenever I can. I have 285 frost emblems and I need a little bit of advice as to which tier pieces (or emblem pieces in general) would be a big upgrade with me. I can use a bit of help in the gemming department as well.

http://www.wowarmory.com/character-s...ywall&cn=Aewyl

You'll want to go for 4T10 (head/shoulder/chest/legs) first, before getting any other frost emblem pieces. If you got a decent amount of triumph emblems as well, and still some time away from getting enough emblems the 4th T10 piece, I suggest getting the T9 shoulders+gloves, and the T10 head/chest/legs. Then when you get another 60 badges you can get the T10 shoulders and go back to the saurfang gloves.

After you get those 4 pieces you could get the frost emblem belt, to get you a bit closer to the hardcap.

As for gemming, since you can't get that much arpen yet, it seems a good idea to keep taking the good (6 agi) socket bonuses that require only 1 non-red gem to activate (activate them with a nightmare tear, or agi+crit gems). Put 20 arpen in the other sockets.

http://www.wowarmory.com/character-s...ra&cn=Linoralt

I'm curious to see what improvements I could make to my current gear, be it gems or whatever.

I'm next in line for DBW, and 2nd for the Sindragosa 25m necklace. Those are the 2 remaining drops I need. I suppose if WFS drops from our 10 this week, I'll swap that out with my DMC:G.

I'd switch to agi on boots, since you are over the hitcap atm. Other than that, looks good to me
(softcap+scorpion/mjolnir also shows as a slight upgrade, however if you are next for DBW then doing a full regem x2 would probably not be worth it for that tiny dps increase).

[Deleted]

http://eu.wowarmory.com/character-sh...llen&cn=Huxley

Looking for further opinions on possible upgrades, council hc boots and WFS hc come to my mind, anything else I'm pretty unsure about. (no 25man hardmode stuff so far)

What I'm more concerned about: about any new weapon will drop me below hit&arp cap, should I go straight for arp or try to keep my caps? (I somewhat remember rawr telling me to got for arp, but simcraft giving me values of about 3.7 for hit&exp, so I'm unsure, I could also swap in heroic icewalker threads but that shouldn't be the best thing either)

It's not bad to go below the hit/exp caps if your crit is nowhere near the crit cap.

Since you only got 65% crit raidbuffed (10% below the crit cap), you can easily drop some expertise/hit in favor of more agi/crit (gloves enchant, and yellow sockets in weapon/legs). That way you'll miss 2% of the time, but you're still 8% from the crit cap (tested in both rawr and simcraft).

If you get a new weapon without hit/arpen, you probably should do some careful checking in simcraft before deciding if it's actually an upgrade or not. A higher ilvl weapon will pretty much always be worth taking, after that arpen will have priority. But if you drop too much hit in the process then things might change again :P