Reforge or gem for hit/expertise?

[Tailstrike]

Ok so finally got a bit of gear behind me by healing and getting loot spec ret/prot for my prot set.

And now the question of reforging or gemming comes into play.

Should i always reforge as much as possible before reaching for gems to make up the difference?

My thoughts are reforge first see what's left and go from there to make up for - as in reforge for hit/exp as much as possible and then move into gems for it if i cant get what i need from gear.

I know my gear is a miss match from all types of raids (no set bonuses yet or anything) but for references sake ill link my armory for interests sake - and yes i know i have no gems/enchants and reforges yet.

Turns out i cant link yet - so my toon is Photas - Frostmourne

Bet the first answer is a YES but still want to check

Thanks all in advance

[Garnthal]

I would go pure haste gems in yellow sockets (so 3 pure haste gems) and haste / hit x3 (lightning wild jade to be clear) in your blue slots + belt buckle socket, and expertise / haste x5(wicked vermilion onyx) in red sockets with 3 expertise(precise primordial ruby) in 3 red sockets.

Reforging I would go as followed:

Weapon mastery -> expertise
Shield parry -> expertise
Helm master -> haste
Neck(leave alone)
Shoulders crit -> expertise
Chest crit -> expertise
Cloak crit -> haste
Belt haste -> expertise
Bracers crit -> hit
Gloves expertise -> hit
Legs (leave alone)
Boots mastery -> hit
Clifftbreaker seal crit -> hit
Ring of the shattered shell dodge -> haste
Trinket haste -> expertise

All of that should get you to 7.50% hit and 15.00% expertise dead on with giving you 18.60% haste.

[Deleted]

Most of the times you want to reforge into expertise cap as that way you can gem full haste. The thing for you is that you dont have the best itemized gear. So you can go out of the norm a bit.

This is what my AMR wants to do with your gear using my own stat weights.



The yellow gems = 320 haste
Orange = 160 haste/exp
Blue = 160 haste/hit

This obviously puts you below expertise cap as many people here frown upon, but with your gear I would have no problem running below expertise cap for the extra haste. You kinda need it in my opinion, but guess you have to make an active choice how high you value the expertise cap.

[Tailstrike]

Well i ended up reforging before gemming at this stage and it turned out i could hit both caps (hit and expertise) with no gems.

This is my armory - http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...hotas/advanced

Is this effective at this stage with my gear?

[Kortane]

Well i ended up reforging before gemming at this stage and it turned out i could hit both caps (hit and expertise) with no gems.

This is my armory - http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...hotas/advanced

Is this effective at this stage with my gear?

Yeah, that looks good! You could squeeze the tiniest bit more haste out of your gear; even less depending on what boot enchant you prefer. The difference is tiny though, like I said :P

Just enchant your shield and legs!

[Deleted]

Well i ended up reforging before gemming at this stage and it turned out i could hit both caps (hit and expertise) with no gems.

This is my armory - http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...hotas/advanced

Is this effective at this stage with my gear?

You are loosing few hundreds of stats for ignoring your socket bonuses, for which you have no reason for. It ain't crippling, but it is far from perfect either.

[celinamuna]

You are loosing few hundreds of stats for ignoring your socket bonuses, for which you have no reason for. It ain't crippling, but it is far from perfect either.

The only worthwile socket that he lost is +120 mastery, everything is +str which is useless.

[Deleted]

The only worthwile socket that he lost is +120 mastery, everything is +str which is useless.

It isn't "useless" it gives AP and parry. Not a significant amount, but he would get it for free, so..? Shouldn't I enchant my weapon with DS, as it only gives Str? And thus is useless? Shouldn't I use Synapse Springs as it is only Str? Really?

[Lackluster]

Reforge as much hit/exp as you can without sacrificing haste (that means never reforge out of haste and reforge into haste on every item that doesn't have it). If that's not enough start shooting for socket bonuses with hit/haste and exp/haste gems.
The tricky part is balancing your hit and expertise as close to the caps as possible and pouring the excess into mastery. Luckily there's addons and websites to do the bruteforcing for you.

Well i ended up reforging before gemming at this stage and it turned out i could hit both caps (hit and expertise) with no gems.

This is my armory - http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...hotas/advanced

Is this effective at this stage with my gear?

Since you're actually reforging OUT of haste on some items, you'd be better off not doing this and reaching the cap with wicked vermilion onyxes instead. The result would be the same amount of haste and expertise only with the socket bonuses for free.
You reforged 479 expertise into haste so in your case I'd undo those reforges and put orange gems in your boots + weapon probably. 120 mastery and 60 str gain!

[LuisKA]

It isn't "useless" it gives AP and parry. Not a significant amount, but he would get it for free, so..? Shouldn't I enchant my weapon with DS, as it only gives Str? And thus is useless? Shouldn't I use Synapse Springs as it is only Str? Really?

It is not free, you miss out a significant amount of haste by doing that, which is far better than the extra strength. I would only do it if you can't get enough hit/exp on reforges or if it allows a "closest to the cap" situation.

[Deleted]

It is not free, you miss out a significant amount of haste by doing that, which is far better than the extra strength. I would only do it if you can't get enough hit/exp on reforges or if it allows a "closest to the cap" situation.

Maybe, just maybe, check the OPs gear.
Just with a quick check on AMR, he can sacrifice 0.34% (~145 rating) haste, which according to you is significant....

For:
+ 540 Str
+ 120 Mastery

Which is "insignificant" according to some...?

-_-

[LuisKA]

I'm answering to your previous post not to the OP gearing, there is no need to be rude. And no, you should not be using Dancing Steel.

[Deleted]

I'm answering to your previous post not to the OP gearing, there is no need to be rude. And no, you should not be using Dancing Steel.

I'm taking a 1650 Str proc over a 1500 mastery/crit proc.
Since I'm already haste-caped, the haste proc is useless for me. And even the 1500 mastery proc is questionable in usefulness.
So yes, I should be using it.

[nightfalls]

My thoughts are reforge first see what's left and go from there to make up for - as in reforge for hit/exp as much as possible and then move into gems for it if i cant get what i need from gear.

I would say the reverse, gem first then reforge.

If you can't make your caps, then change your gems (for Protection typically I will use Exp/Haste over Str/Haste or Parry/Haste to make the 5100 - well for us, 4760 - expertise cap). But you're almost always going to end up better off by doing that order.

So basically to answer your initial question:

Should i always reforge as much as possible before reaching for gems to make up the difference?

I would say no; in fact, do the opposite.


With regards to gemming: I'll always go for socket bonuses, call me OCD about it. Some I know will just gem Haste in everything with no regard (for the most part, that is done out of laziness). The "intelligent" thing to do (for very minimal gain) would actually be to look at the socket bonus and decide if it's worth taking on an individual item basis.

[Lackluster]

So rarely are socket bonuses worth it in current gear. Helmets typically offer a very good bonus (3 gems worth due to the meta) for only 1 off-colour socket so they're a prime candidate if they're offering a useful stat. Other than that our non-set gear has way too many strength bonuses which really have very little value compared to haste; skip those bonuses!

Blindly gemming orange and green gems before checking how much hit/exp you can reforge into (without reforging out of haste!) is in my opinion a mistake. Don't sacrifice haste for stats such as strength/dodge/parry that are worth so much less!
The way I see it is to maximize my haste and distribute the rest of the reforgeable budget between hit, expertise and mastery.

You can argue that the "intelligent" thing to do is to judge each item by itself, which is true, but generally worthwhile socket bonuses are the exception rather than the rule.

[Deleted]

You can do it generally in 2 scenario:

a) You have great gear. -> You could go over the haste-cap, but that makes no sense. Here you either stop reforging into haste on some items, and/or change some of your gems for hybrid ones. With the second one, you gain extra free stats, so mostly it is more beneficial.

b) You have crap gear. -> You won't reach hit/exp with only reforges, if you don't sacrifice haste. In this case it makes more sense to gem hit/exp and pick the socket bonuses. The overall amount of rating that you can put into the three (hit/exp/haste) won't change.

[Tailstrike]

So im going to go back a review my reforges once i get to log back in after the rolling restarts and see what i can do. Have a bit of a play and see where i can go from there.