[BM] Hit and Exp: why you don't have to cap them

[SSHA778]

Your haste is irrelevant here but you cannot afford to have several moments per encounter where you're missing too many attacks in a row for consistent shuffle uptime.

If we're going to make such a big deal about movement, then it should probably be pointed out that if the movement is going to take long enough, you're going to be topped off before you reach the boss. Thus, not getting Shuffle up immediately won't kill you.

Nevertheless:

Moderate "worst-case" scenario (no KS, but you do have the energy since you ran around):

Average time for Shuffle (hard-capped): 2.00 GCDs
15% negation (7.5% failure): 2.16 GCDs
7.5% negation (15% failure): 2.35 GCDs
0% negation (22.5% failure, unreasonably attainable): 2.58 GCDs

These time frames aren't really radically far off from the hard-capped setup. While, yes, you can't have a fractional GCD, the decimal serves to illustrate the probability of having to spend an extra GCD. The closer the decimal is to 1, the more frequently it happens.

Are you suggesting that the energy and Chi refund mechanics are specific to Brewmasters in Ox Stance?

Chi is not refunded when Blackout Kick misses because Shuffle is applied. Otherwise, you'd want to miss Blackout Kick for free chi.

First, being able to hit the boss when you need to is important for other things as well - e.g. if you taunt the boss, throw a keg smash, it gets parried, the other tank gets aggro back. Sure, you can tell him to stop attacking, but that could be a significant loss of damage.

This would be why you front-load your threat on a taunt swap. This is not a radical idea even if you are hit/expertise capped, and the nature of the relationship between energy/chi allows you to do this with no loss.

This is by no means a compensatory measure, and as much as you all seem to hate and harp on having even a 1% chance of failure, logically, then, it would strike me odd if you didn't already do this. But you probably don't, because if you did, you wouldn't have posted this.

Second, you hardly need any haste to have 100% shuffle, so any additional haste affects things like PB or chi wave usage, which are of less importance (you really don't need to PB after every attack).

Shuffle hasn't been the arguing point for haste.

[d07RiV]

Shuffle hasn't been the arguing point for haste.

Okay now I see that (missed this while reading the first post).

Then what's the point? If we agree that shuffle uptime isn't a problem, then what are you trying to maximize? If its dps, then you still need hit/exp. If its EH, then stam/mastery is the way to go, not haste. If you want to use as much PB/guard/chiwave as possible, then haste might be the best stat, but that seems to be further from reality than the first two goals.

[Disgruntler]

Are you suggesting that the energy and Chi refund mechanics are specific to Brewmasters in Ox Stance?

Instead of asking this rhetorical nonsense, do what I did, and test the right ability in the right spec and the right stance, and figure it why you are wrong for yourself.

I didn't test it in Tiger Stance for brewmasters, but I doubt it refunds chi there either because you DO get shuffle time.

[Chuupag]

Okay now I see that (missed this while reading the first post).

Then what's the point? If we agree that shuffle uptime isn't a problem, then what are you trying to maximize? If its dps, then you still need hit/exp. If its EH, then stam/mastery is the way to go, not haste. If you want to use as much PB/guard/chiwave as possible, then haste might be the best stat, but that seems to be further from reality than the first two goals.

Elusive brew would like a word with you. Haste is roughly 33% as effective at EB as crit is.

[Shootz]

If we're going to make such a big deal about movement, then it should probably be pointed out that if the movement is going to take long enough, you're going to be topped off before you reach the boss. Thus, not getting Shuffle up immediately won't kill you.

Except sometimes it will kill you and every time it does you are wasting your guild's time for no reason other than you wanted to reforge like a special butterfly. Maybe you're not seeing encounters where even one attack without shuffle up is enough to make you dead, that's fine, reforge what you want, you could not reforge at all and it probably won't matter. Some of us need certainty and consistency and that's what hit and expertise gets you.

[Chuupag]

Except sometimes it will kill you and every time it does you are wasting your guild's time for no reason other than you wanted to reforge like a special butterfly. Maybe you're not seeing encounters where even one attack without shuffle up is enough to make you dead, that's fine, reforge what you want, you could not reforge at all and it probably won't matter. Some of us need certainty and consistency and that's what hit and expertise gets you.

I don't think 'except when it doesn't' is a very valid argument. SSHA's math above showed that even with 0/0, which again you cannot get to, you still get shuffle up in 2 gcds about half the time in the scenario you brought up. If you are so very worried about it use expel harm while you're moving and cut the possibility down even further.

Also please show me the boss where you get 1-shotted w/o shuffle up.

---------- Post added 2012-11-16 at 07:31 AM ----------

Everyone keeps bringing up "wasting your guild's time" by not taking the caps. Has anyone taken a moment to think that you could possibly save wipes with the benefits of haste/crit? If the .004% event of missing consecutive times can have so much importance why not the .004% dodging multiple times in a row to save a would be wipe.

[Shootz]

Also please show me the boss where you get 1-shotted w/o shuffle up.

Heroic Tay'ak. After an unseen strike I need to get shuffle up immediately or his overwhelming assault coupled with normal attacks WILL kill me. If Keg Smash misses I then have to jab twice before BoK giving me four global cooldowns before shuffle is up, that's unacceptable, two globals is already stretching it. That aside, it's not about getting one shot, it's about taking 25%+ more damage from hits than what your healers are expecting. Take a couple of those in a row (It will happen, healers don't always have ninjalike reaction speeds) and you are dead, the raid wipes, you're enjoying a run back.

Everyone keeps bringing up "wasting your guild's time" by not taking the caps. Has anyone taken a moment to think that you could possibly save wipes with the benefits of haste/crit? If the .004% event of missing consecutive times can have so much importance why not the .004% dodging multiple times in a row to save a would be wipe.

One is reliable, one is not. It's as simple as that. Your focus appears to be on what your 'damage taken' number looks like at the end of a fight, that's not relevant. What is relevant is a) having mitigation you can rely on when and where you need it and b) taking damage that is predictable by yourself and your healers. One of the biggest things that will kill tanks and wipe a raid is unpredictable damage so because of this you absolutely cannot afford to have unpredictable initial shuffle uptime so that you can dodge or purify a few extra attacks later on down the track. There's no later on if you're dead.

As was noted before, it's not a 0.004% chance that your shuffle is going to take 4+ GCDs to get up instead of the ideal 2. If you add up all the dodge, parry and miss chances for your first keg smash you get something that looks closer to a 1 in 5 chance of your shuffle taking 4+ GCDs to put up. It's simply not acceptable if you're engaging in progression raiding.

[Chuupag]

Heroic Tay'ak. After an unseen strike I need to get shuffle up immediately or his overwhelming assault coupled with normal attacks WILL kill me. If Keg Smash misses I then have to jab twice before BoK giving me four global cooldowns before shuffle is up, that's unacceptable, two globals is already stretching it. That aside, it's not about getting one shot, it's about taking 25%+ more damage from hits than what your healers are expecting. Take a couple of those in a row (It will happen, healers don't always have ninjalike reaction speeds) and you are dead, the raid wipes, you're enjoying a run back.



One is reliable, one is not. It's as simple as that. Your focus appears to be on what your 'damage taken' number looks like at the end of a fight, that's not relevant. What is relevant is a) having mitigation you can rely on when and where you need it and b) taking damage that is predictable by yourself and your healers. One of the biggest things that will kill tanks and wipe a raid is unpredictable damage so because of this you absolutely cannot afford to have unpredictable initial shuffle uptime so that you can dodge or purify a few extra attacks later on down the track. There's no later on if you're dead.

As was noted before, it's not a 0.004% chance that your shuffle is going to take 4+ GCDs to get up instead of the ideal 2. If you add up all the dodge, parry and miss chances for your first keg smash you get something that looks closer to a 1 in 5 chance of your shuffle taking 4+ GCDs to put up. It's simply not acceptable if you're engaging in progression raiding.

Just wanted to clarify, since you basically said you would get 1-shot a few posts ago, that it's really 3 attacks.

Let's do the math right here so no one is confused. If you are trying to Keg Smash -> Blackout Kick, and have 15% chance to not land, which is about as low as you can go, then you will have about 3 in 20 chance of it taking more than 2 gcd...not 1 in 5.

This absolute worst case scenario you are putting forth would require that you 1) don't have any chi, 2) do not have shuffle up, or shuffle less than 2 seconds left, 3) Keg Smash is off cooldown, 4) Power Strikes is on cooldown, and 5) you are going to die in 3 seconds if you don't have shuffle up. Only if all 5 of those criteria is met does that 3 in 20 chance come into play.

[Shootz]

Let's do the math right here so no one is confused. If you are trying to Keg Smash -> Blackout Kick, and have 15% chance to not land, which is about as low as you can go, then you will have about 3 in 20 chance of it taking more than 2 gcd...not 1 in 5.

This absolute worst case scenario you are putting forth would require that you 1) don't have any chi, 2) do not have shuffle up, or shuffle less than 2 seconds left, 3) Keg Smash is off cooldown, 4) Power Strikes is on cooldown, and 5) you are going to die in 3 seconds if you don't have shuffle up. Only if all 5 of those criteria is met does that 3 in 20 chance come into play.

A 3 in 20 chance is a 1 in 6.66 chance. I know putting it in terms like 3 in 20 makes it seem less likely but the number is still 1 in 6.66, very close to 1 in 5. The way you get your 3 in 20 chance is to assume that you are going to have +7.5% to hit/avoid dodge/avoid parry inevitably. Are you now saying that there is a minimum amount of exp/hit that you should have? Or would you be quite confident that having 0% and 0% would be ideal if you could exchange those points for a different secondary stat? (Even if it's not likely to be possible)

The situation I'm describing happens often enough that it would be a problem without hit/exp. (I accept all of your points except for number 5, it's not about dying in 3 seconds it's about taking unpredictable damage that catches the rest of your raid team unaware and is a direct cause of your death or potentially someone else's death as suddenly all healers scramble to heal you)

I only have to think back to the last raid I attended to give you a real world example. Most times after using Zen Meditation to stand outside of a force and verve my shuffle will wear off and I'll need to quickly reapply it before I start taking hits again. Now sometimes I'll have the chi to do this without using Keg Smash, sometimes I will have put up a guard or purified a large stagger and I won't have the chi. Now maybe I've made a mistake in not having spare chi to reapply shuffle after Zen Med but having the hit/exp to quickly KS BoK saves me taking too big a hit for the single healer on my platform to deal with comfortably and it saves a raid wipe.

On the very next boss Tay'ak my shuffle will wear off constantly because of Tempest Storm(or blade or whatever) and unseen strike. I need to be able to get my shuffle up immediately or else I'm going to get one shot by unrelenting assault or at the very least I'm going to get hammered hard enough to make the healers panic, maybe I die, maybe the person with the debuff dies, either way it's not an ideal situation.

These situations happen, I experienced them every single attempt on Tay'ak and I have experienced them on countless other bosses, it is in our best interests to do what we can to avoid these situations as much as possible.

[SurrealNight]

Finally got a 1/6 HoF kill and work on 2nd boss. Exp hard cap is terrible build at my gear level I'm ditching it. Felt like my energy bar was crawling and I never had Chi for shuffle or PB when I wanted it.

I literally found myself staring at my energy bar and tapping my foot even though the "time" difference is rather small. I tried it, my mind is made up.

[gynshon]

Finally got a 1/6 HoF kill and work on 2nd boss. Exp hard cap is terrible build at my gear level I'm ditching it. Felt like my energy bar was crawling and I never had Chi for shuffle or PB when I wanted it.

I literally found myself staring at my energy bar and tapping my foot even though the "time" difference is rather small. I tried it, my mind is made up.

I told you so.... 8P

[Deleted]

Ok so let me see if i get this straight. The OP post tells me that if i go all out haste instead of capping hit/expertise i will get a 1chi/min and this will give a very small amount of additional survivability in the long run right?

Ok so what I'm seeing in my mind right now is two trinkets: Use: gain 1 chi for survivability (1min cd) or (passive 2550 hit rating AND 5100 expertise rating for dps)

This is basically what we are discussing right? 1 survival chi/min vs 7650 total dps stats? without even going into the whole reliable rotation subject.

Since the survivability is "almost" the same for both setups the 1 chi is what is suppose to convince me to take the first trinket. If these trinkets where in the game i would love to see anyone actually justify taking the first one, but some seem to think that survivability > anything else.

[Disgruntler]

The difference between the two is not just overall chi generation but when you get the chi and when you can do what you like with the chi.

Haste vs hit/expertise might give you over-all faster production of chi--but it doesn't allow you to necessarily HAVE that chi when you want it.

Let's say in five seconds the boss is doing something big. You've pooled 60 energy so your plan is:

Keg Smash->Guard->Jab->TP->(get hit by the ability which is mitigated)TP->Purifying Brew->Keg Smash

If you miss with that Keg Smash, however, instead it looks like:

Keg Smash (miss)->Jab->TP->Jab->(get hit by the ability which is not mitigated)Guard->TP->Keg Smash

Notice some problems with this:
1) You took a big hit and you didn't want to.
2) You don't have purify up when you want it, and so you're taking extra ticks of stagger you didn't want to
3) You may not even have the reaction time to notice the miss in time and can lose additional seconds--this is assuming perfect play.

On the other hand, having more haste may give you that extra chi going into it so that you have room for error. There is something to be said for the certainty of having a jab/ks every 3 seconds like clockwork--but that's only 4684 haste rating.

[SurrealNight]

I told you so.... 8P

I like giving opinions based on experience since I'm not posting walls of math. Play style the exp hard cap is just terrible Theory crafter's away I'll say don't do it.

I'm at the AH right now converting back, will never again even try for the hard cap.

[Inuyaki]

I only have to think back to the last raid I attended to give you a real world example. Most times after using Zen Meditation to stand outside of a force and verve my shuffle will wear off and I'll need to quickly reapply it before I start taking hits again.

Zen Meditation does work with Force and Verve? I thought it only works against magical damage?

But at that fight there is another op spell
ChiBurst is really nice there. Makro-target one of the outer players and ChiBurst him, with a good positioning you get at least all people in 2 zones (with luck all 3 zones, depending on their spawnpoints), which really helps out with healing. And you heal yourself too.
And I have no Shuffle and Chi after that phase too, yeah...

[Chuupag]

Heroic Tay'ak. After an unseen strike I need to get shuffle up immediately or his overwhelming assault coupled with normal attacks WILL kill me. If Keg Smash misses I then have to jab twice before BoK giving me four global cooldowns before shuffle is up, that's unacceptable, two globals is already stretching it. That aside, it's not about getting one shot, it's about taking 25%+ more damage from hits than what your healers are expecting. Take a couple of those in a row (It will happen, healers don't always have ninjalike reaction speeds) and you are dead, the raid wipes, you're enjoying a run back.



One is reliable, one is not. It's as simple as that. Your focus appears to be on what your 'damage taken' number looks like at the end of a fight, that's not relevant. What is relevant is a) having mitigation you can rely on when and where you need it and b) taking damage that is predictable by yourself and your healers. One of the biggest things that will kill tanks and wipe a raid is unpredictable damage so because of this you absolutely cannot afford to have unpredictable initial shuffle uptime so that you can dodge or purify a few extra attacks later on down the track. There's no later on if you're dead.

As was noted before, it's not a 0.004% chance that your shuffle is going to take 4+ GCDs to get up instead of the ideal 2. If you add up all the dodge, parry and miss chances for your first keg smash you get something that looks closer to a 1 in 5 chance of your shuffle taking 4+ GCDs to put up. It's simply not acceptable if you're engaging in progression raiding.

Elusuve Brew does not require chi and is off the gcd. I don't see how you can say dodge is unreliable with 70%+ avoidance on demand. Hit/exp does not affect EB generation...so dropping those stats would give you more no matter if you put the stats in haste or crit.

Also I was using the 15% chance to not land because that is about as low as you can go even reforging out of the hit and exp native on your gear.

And again...if you are gaining energy, and therefor chi, you would be less likely to be in such a situation where those 4, or 5, criteria are met. It is a slight change in playstyle, sometimes sitting on 1 chi, but since you are gaining chi I can't see those situations happening more frequently than with the caps.

---------- Post added 2012-11-17 at 10:49 AM ----------

Ok so let me see if i get this straight. The OP post tells me that if i go all out haste instead of capping hit/expertise i will get a 1chi/min and this will give a very small amount of additional survivability in the long run right?

Ok so what I'm seeing in my mind right now is two trinkets: Use: gain 1 chi for survivability (1min cd) or (passive 2550 hit rating AND 5100 expertise rating for dps)

This is basically what we are discussing right? 1 survival chi/min vs 7650 total dps stats? without even going into the whole reliable rotation subject.

Since the survivability is "almost" the same for both setups the 1 chi is what is suppose to convince me to take the first trinket. If these trinkets where in the game i would love to see anyone actually justify taking the first one, but some seem to think that survivability > anything else.

You also would gain about 7 seconds of EB a min, not just 1 chi, if you were somehow able to drop all 7k points into haste. In the OP I was simply trying to show the extremes. More detailed breakdown on a per point basis is in post #45. And your analogy is further incorrect; haste and crit are also dps stats, crit to almost the exact same degree as hit/exp.

[Yohassakura]

Purifying Brew does not require chi and is off the gcd.

Purifying brew requires 1 chi ( and is off the gcd, like you said, though it has its own 1 second cooldown ).

[Chuupag]

Purifying brew requires 1 chi ( and is off the gcd, like you said, though it has its own 1 second cooldown ).

I meant Elusive...as was easy discernible from the next statement. Fix'd.

[Inuyaki]

Where do you get 70%+ avoidance?
Reforging into that or what?

[Chuupag]

Where do you get 70%+ avoidance?
Reforging into that or what?

Base avoidance of 20%. Shuffle for 20%. Elusive Brew for 30%(35% with 2-set).