(Cataclysm) Strength. One handers. Not free loot?

[seigfried13]

If you give them 2 AP from Strength, why would they want the Strength weapons, seigfried, when the Agility weapons still give them crit (less, but it's there) as well as probably balancing their mana around the "main stat" of the spec. Shaman would still go for the Agility weapons.

If you made it better, then you create the problems with their entire gear set either having to split off (again) in itemisation (which is what we're trying to fix in the first place, this would be worse), or the fact that they're balanced around sub-optimum stat allocation at-best.

Dethric, in bringing it up, was clear that the suggested change wasn't to be "all shaman's prefer str weapons" so much as "str weapons can be an upgrade". It would be as simple as giving bonus to Str in whatever talents/benefits apply to Agi to make a 2.6 str 1h with haste and mastery an obvious upgrade from a 1.5 agi weapon with less desirable stats (hit/exp at cap?). I do agree with it being a bit of a step back as far as simplifying itemization goes, but the move by Blizzard to even include STR 1h weapons speaks volumes against that theme as well, unless of course there is some missing factor they have planned. This entire thread is just an inquiry about the justification for putting the STR 1h'ers in without catering to a single spec of a single class (dw frost).

[Shiira]

Okay, so Death Knights, given the haste pooling that is getting tossed into the Frost Tree, what kind of weapon speed would you be looking for, ideally?

As slow as possible, haste bonuses are nice for more auto attack damage and killing machine procs but we always want slow weapons for big instant attacks.

[Zerioc]

As it's been said, Frosties would most likely be sharing with Prots ( Both Warrior and Paladin variaties ) for STR DPS weapons.


They've said that they want Hero Strike and stuff like that to not be on next swing, so a slow tank weapon wont be a problem at all.



[e]: Also, just because I would find it amusing... isn't it bad to post the same thread in multiple sections? If so I find it lolworthy that a mod is doing it! :P

[Shelly]

To paraphrase what I said in the warrior forums.

You're right, it would be so very silly of them to have dps Str one handers. It's almost as stupid and crazy an idea as making spell power plate that could only be used for one spec out of all the plate dps classes.

Now note that I'm not saying that we won't get 2.6+ speed weapons that are equally as nice for tanking as dps, filled with hit, mastery and expertise. What I'm saying is that they'll have some weapons that are most definitely more dps oriented and that in all likelihood tanks will still want the faster weapons since they can typically crank out more TPS by hitting faster.

Although I do think much of our weapons will be moved more to the 1.7 to 2.0 speed to just piss everyone off.

[Gestopft]

Any dual wielding class will want strength 1-handers. The most important stat on a weapon is weapon damage, so if the damage is an upgrade, Rogues and Shaman will want them too.

As someone said, look at polearms. Most of them are Agi based, which isn't optimal for melee classes, but they take them because the weapon damage is more important.

DPS one handers will be just like two handers today, coming in Agi and Str varieties.

[Sigrah]

Okay, so Death Knights, given the haste pooling that is getting tossed into the Frost Tree, what kind of weapon speed would you be looking for, ideally?

Unless they change how our instant attacks work, we'll always want the slowest 1-hander possible, just like how Blood and Unholy DK's want the slowest 2-hander possible. This is what Frost DK's will typically use in their line-up:

Icy Touch: Doesn't rely on Weapon Damage.
Plague Strike: 50% Weapon Damage + X additional damage.
Obliterate: 100% Weapon Damage + X additional damage + 12.5% damage per disease on the target.
Blood Strike: 44% Weapon Damage + X additional damage + 12.5% damage per disease on the target.
Frost Strike: 60% to 61% + X additional damage.
Howling Blast: Doesn't rely on Weapon Damage.

Since most of our abilities deal X% of our weapon damage, we want weapons that deliver the highest possible damage on a single hit. Since slow 1-handers have a higher maximum damage per hit, those are the ones we want to use. Giving us extra haste doesn't really change things that much, it just boosts our white damage a bit and gives us more procs with Killing Machine, Rune of Cinderglacier, and Rune of Razorice.

[Baabinator]

Perhaps they will remove all tanking stats from weapon (just like DK and Druid are now) and will make 1h str weapons for DK's, Pala tanks and Warr tanks.

[Deamoneyes]

Perhaps they will remove all tanking stats from weapon (just like DK and Druid are now) and will make 1h str weapons for DK's, Pala tanks and Warr tanks.

this would be nice, it would just require different weapon speed between the 1hs

[Albert the fish]

all they'd have to do is take a good chunk of what they feel are the 'tank' skills and apply weapon dmh modifiers to them for palis and warrs.
oh and kill the current defense weapons, since we we all get def cap talented
not all of them, just shit like devastate, revenge, sunder armor. and Shield of right and holy shield and whatever else they use

leave off abilities that tend to be shared like heroic strike and consecrate. you should generally end up with tanks wanting the slow heavy str weapons to build high threat while dps will still opt for faster attacks since they won't be using the attacks that get help from slower weapons.

[Azoxa]

Does it really matter ? A frost DK could just use reforging in cataclysm to change the agility to strength.

[BoxofRox]

I think that, if Holy Pallys get their own entire gear set to themselves, we should be able to at least get a slow, STR 1 hand. Is that too much to ask for?

[lordkasner]

ok for 1 thier only removing def rating not parry/dodge/exp/hit from tanking weaps L2R better

[frester]

Perhaps they will remove all tanking stats from weapon (just like DK and Druid are now) and will make 1h str weapons for DK's, Pala tanks and Warr tanks.

i think they will go for that solution, and change all the silly scaling skills, so no tank would want [swift wet towel of purple] but would prefer hard hitting weaps for better aggro and better scaling as this is what they want to accomplish ultimately.

[Zamfix]

Strength. One handers. Currently, there's one spec that drools over the prospect (go, you awesome Frost Death Knights, you), but... no one else uses them. Period.

ACTUALLY you are wrong, i have a lv 80 warrior and i toyed around with the stats, and i got bladestorm + dual wield specialization, and i can pull approx 4k dps with it, and with the 5 extra points in cata i would most likely be able to pull more

No, you're still wrong. Just because you made some abomination of a spec and did mediocre DPS with it, doesn't mean its good. No one who wants to be remotely competitive in WoW would use a half-baked spec like that. Blizzard doesn't cater to crazy fringe people who think terrible specs make them "different".

[Lansworthy]

Who knows, maybe unholy will favor one hands in cata? No one knows for now

[Albert the fish]

ok for 1 thier only removing def rating not parry/dodge/exp/hit from tanking weaps L2R better

actually they never said that

they said they are removing def rating and never mentioned the other tank stats on weapons at all one way or the other.
so you, in fact, are the one that should learn to read better.

people here are theorizing what the statements made and what's been left unsaid might mean. it's all conjecture and no one if right or wrong inherently. except for you, for trying to correct people based on a faulty assumption.



personally i feel it would be a good idea to strip weapons down to hit/expert/mastery and core stats. make all weapons(melee weapons im speaking of) raw dps allocation.
revamp the core 'tank' skills in paly and warrior trees to take advantage of slow swing times by making them use weapon dmg. leave shared skills and pure dps skills alone so that they continue to favor faster weapons

in this way weapons should bring nothing more to the fight than dps/tps, which are joined at the hip anyway. this make the entire weapon system a little smoother i think. it'll also allow tanks to have more tanky armor, since the overall stat allocation for a character wouldn't need as many stat points on armor,(it's all in the weapon now) and they'd have a little more room for defensive stats on armor.

it should also hopefully make all tanks want slow dps weapons which would solve blizzard's issue with making specific items for every spec.

as for holy palis all you'd need is a deep tree talent that converts str to spellpower or mp5 of a sort. yes i know int and spirit are taking the place of spellpower and mp5 soon but the stats will still exist, just in a more hidden and indirect format.

in this manner you could have ret and holy rolling on similar gear sets, with only tiered pieces really making huge divides.

[whowherewhat?]

Take http://www.wowhead.com/?item=37401 for example.
Take away the defense, add a talent for tanks that gives x% avoidance per point of str and voila, you have a tanking weapon that doubles as a frost dps sword (albeit a terrible one XD) depending on your spec. It seems like blizz is adding alot of base stat->non-base stat conversions (e.g. ele shamans spirit->hit rating conversion) so this doesn't seem too far-fetched of an idea

[Gilgemesh]

cloth wearers will favor int, leather agi, mail agi, plate str. The strength 1 handers are likely there to serve a purpose for both tanking and 1h dps. For all we know they could be making dw 1 handers good for all dk specs, possibly for warriors, maybe even for pallies(totally not OP). And I'm sure with the removal of defense, all tanks are going to want dps weapons. Plus with the stat changes that professions are going to give, we might be able to trade strength for agi or the other direction, meaning all dps 1 handers could possibly be strength OR agi.

[Annaconda]

Maybe dw 1h as fury will be a bit usefull again.

[Astray]

Since warriors rage will change, the need to have fast tank weapons will as well.

Since def is no longer needed and mastery is a dps and tank stat at the same time i don't see a problem with sared str weapons.

-str
-stam
-exp
-hit
-mastery
-Sockets