Rathrak, the Poisonous Mind

[Hoocha]

For the first time in our guilds 12 month history there were 10 core members online on a Saturday night and we decided to do an impromptu raid. Needless to say, everything went cruisy and before we knew it we had deathwing down (only making the phase 2 transition by 2 seconds, but that's another story). On account of being the only non-lengendarified spell dps this was mine for the taking, Rathrak, the Poisonous Mind.

My initial thoughts on the item -> no green stats??! Compared to my heroic volcanospike this is a loss of 139 haste and 119 hit, however my stat weightings suggest that this is more than made up for by the 23 int and 309sp (probably offset by the loss of an immolate tick if I'm destro). This is particularly interesting because it helps to improve my reforge options, by essentially giving me more pieces where I can reforge out of crit/mastery (I'm currently playing aff/destro).

So it seems that it will be about equal before considering the proc.

Equip: Your harmful spellcasts have a chance to poison all enemies near your target for 8710 nature damage over 10 sec.

After searching around on the internet I think I've found a few things out about it. Supposedly the proc
-Has a 15sec icd and a 15% chance to proc
-Doesn't scale with spellpower
-Doesn't proc off dot ticks
-Does scale with talents and other non haste based modifiers.

With my technically incompetent and most likely grossly incorrect maths that means 6.66 casts would be the expected requirement to cause a proc and I estimate a cast occuring once every 1.2s. it would take about 8 seconds for it to proc, so you get on average 1 proc per 23s. Dividing the proc damage (+10% spell damage taken) by 23 seconds gives 410dps or the equivalent damage of about 220 haste, putting it about 50(?) stats below item budget. Because the proc is static the item wouldn't be expected to scale as positively with other gear as other pieces would.

So I guess it should be a pretty upgrade. Does anyone else with the item have any thoughts? Evidence of how much damage it translates to in the real world or ideas of fights where the proc might be useful. Madness of Deathwing comes to mind but I'm really not sure that it would add that much as adds can rarely be expected to live for 10s and that's IF it procs right away.

TLDR: Deathwing spelldagger is weirdo.

[Noah37]

Well, first off I would like to say I also am a non-legendaryfied Mage, because I have been busy for the entire semester and haven't really been doing any FL. I also am very jealous, because this is one of the better weapons I could get (according to MaxDPS). But, just to lend my opinion, according to the MaxDPS calculations on my Arcane Mage, picking that weapon up with the best off hand would be slightly better than pretty much any other weapon or staff (excluding the Dragonwrath of course).

[Hoocha]

It does look a bit that way, there really aren't that many gear choices this tier.

[Napoles]

You should check and see if this affects your felhunters shadow bite, also i would bet the proc does more damage then the tooltip suggests.

[Jahrastafari]

You should check and see if this affects your felhunters shadow bite, also i would bet the proc does more damage then the tooltip suggests.

It doesn't.

[Iammighty]

I got it recently, tested it on dummy (15000000 damage interval), it procs very often and the proc did about 550DPS during my test. You have to keep in mind that in raid environment I'd have more haste = spells would hit more often = more proc uptime = slightly more DPS. When I shadowflame groups of mobs it procs nearly everytime, also it spreads around targets automatically.

I went to BWL to kill Magmaw today for Darkmoon artifact, did 41500DPS ( http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...lizer/advanced ) single target and the poison from dagger did about 85k damage, not too bad I think.

Overall the proc is nothing exceptional but I think that it's way better than passive stats like haste and hit on Volcanospike.

[Xleetskeetx]

Well, I have this on my elemental shaman, and the proc usually does around 2% of my damage over an entire fight. That's probably pretty decent for a proc, but it FEELS very underwhelming after giving up the 391 Shannox staff. I dropped quite a few stats for a little spellpower and a proc that feels like it does nothing.

[Napoles]

So has anyone checked to see if the felhunter gets an extra 30% from his shadowbit when the dot is on the boss?
All you have to do make the felhunter attack a dummy for a little while whithout any dots on the dummy, and then again with you shadowbolting/searing pain till the daggers dot is on dummy and compare the non crit shadowbite damage. I advise taking off all gear that procs spell buffs except the weapon so the shadowbites dont fluctuate too much.

Please if anyone can post their info on this i would be grateful.

---------- Post added 2011-12-07 at 09:06 AM ----------

It doesn't.

What doesnt?

Affect shadowbite damage? or tooltip damage isnt increased in combat?

[Jahrastafari]

So has anyone checked to see if the felhunter gets an extra 30% from his shadowbit when the dot is on the boss?
All you have to do make the felhunter attack a dummy for a little while whithout any dots on the dummy, and then again with you shadowbolting/searing pain till the daggers dot is on dummy and compare the non crit shadowbite damage. I advise taking off all gear that procs spell buffs except the weapon so the shadowbites dont fluctuate too much.

Please if anyone can post their info on this i would be grateful.

---------- Post added 2011-12-07 at 09:06 AM ----------



What doesnt?

Affect shadowbite damage? or tooltip damage isnt increased in combat?

It doesn't apply to the DoT count that amplifies Shadowbite damage.

[Napoles]

It doesn't apply to the DoT count that amplifies Shadowbite damage.

Thanks for clearing that up.

[Taoforums]

I've tested it myself (elemental shaman) and the tooltip once went to 10k+ so yes it scales with some buffs I cannot define yet because I replaced it with Heroic Vagaries of Time from h-Morchok last night. The damage bonus was neater than Heroic Smoldering Censer of Purity from h-Shannox. (offspec and got stuck with staff from regular Chelley's Sterilized Scalpel). I've had my fun, but it was quickly replaced. The base spell power bonus should be sufficient enough (about 300~ compared to heroic (non Ragnaros) weapon) until you get into heroic modes.