[Shadow] Stats: Haste vs. Mastery

[Deleted]

Lovely people! Can you guys help me to clarify which (secondary) stat which should aim for, being level 110 and having progressed some points in the artifact-path?

http://www.wowhead.com/guides/classe...st/shadow/gear has me confused:

‘Our secondary stat priority is this: Haste > Crit > Mastery > Versatility
Further testing required to see how close crit and mastery are. Gameplay mechanics tell us that Haste will be supreme due to its interaction with void form.

Once we obtain the artifact our stat priorities change with Surrender to Madness. When running this talent and having the Gold Trait: Mass Hysteria, our stat priority changes to: Mastery > Crit > Haste > Versatility

The main reason behind this is the more stacks of Voidform we get the more Mass Hysteria does for us. This continues beyond the cap of 100 and could exponentially go on forever. This pairs extremely well with Mastery: Madness.’

- Is it too early to say something about this?
- Should I ignore this, and stay with haste for the moment?
- I guess in some fights we are going to use StM, in some LoTV; Are we going to need 2 sets of gear? One focusing more on haste, another more on mastery?

Thanks for your answers!

- Jaylie

[Gorsameth]

Lovely people! Can you guys help me to clarify which (secondary) stat which should aim for, being level 110 and having progressed some points in the artifact-path?

http://www.wowhead.com/guides/classe...st/shadow/gear has me confused:

‘Our secondary stat priority is this: Haste > Crit > Mastery > Versatility
Further testing required to see how close crit and mastery are. Gameplay mechanics tell us that Haste will be supreme due to its interaction with void form.

Once we obtain the artifact our stat priorities change with Surrender to Madness. When running this talent and having the Gold Trait: Mass Hysteria, our stat priority changes to: Mastery > Crit > Haste > Versatility

The main reason behind this is the more stacks of Voidform we get the more Mass Hysteria does for us. This continues beyond the cap of 100 and could exponentially go on forever. This pairs extremely well with Mastery: Madness.’

- Is it too early to say something about this?
- Should I ignore this, and stay with haste for the moment?
- I guess in some fights we are going to use StM, in some LoTV; Are we going to need 2 sets of gear? One focusing more on haste, another more on mastery?

Thanks for your answers!

- Jaylie

Makes no sense to me.

Haste means longer voidform which means more Mass Hysteria. The stat priority does not change with the artifact.
As some point Mastery might eclipse Crit but I don't see Haste ever losing its #1 spot.

[Deleted]

Makes no sense to me.

Haste means longer voidform which means more Mass Hysteria. The stat priority does not change with the artifact.
As some point Mastery might eclipse Crit but I don't see Haste ever losing its #1 spot.

I agree that it seems odd that haste drops so far, so I can only hazard a guess as to the cause:

MH and mastery scale off of each other, so an increase in mastery doesn't really surprise me. Also, with StM you'll most likely have no issues staying in Void Form long enough to reach 100% haste (VF + regular haste), past which haste is useless (unless I'm mistaken, haste doesn't do anything past 100%). Crit on the other hand gives more insanity (allowing you to reach VF earlier and maintain it longer), but most of all, has great synergy with both mastery and MH. It's probably valued lower because of the variable nature (it's not guaranteed below 100% crit) and probably requires more rating per % than mastery does.

Let's also not forget that we're looking at a very binary list and don't see the actual stat weights. For all we know, the weights were already super close without StM, in which case it wouldn't take much to change the priority. Or it's simply the case that with StM the ratings are super close.

So long story short: I think the reason is that MH has a snowball effect on the scaling of mastery and crit. Due to the unique way StM works, it probably devalues haste because you'll drop out of VF a lot less per fight (or rather, you won't drop out +/- 2 mins before the end due to activating StM).

To word it differently: at 100 stacks of VF, mastery and crit are still valuable (even more so due to more ticks), but haste is not. Obviously it's not that black and white (it's not like you're instantly capped or can stay there very long), but it makes sense if StM allows you to spend huge chunks of the fight with 50+ stacks.

[Rumstein]

You can safely say Haste >= Crit > Mastery > Versatility.

Twintop 20160823 - Emerald Nightmare Stat Weights - Heroic

Mastery is just damage (On ~60+% of our damaging though), while Haste allows more casts in VF, meaning more time spent in VF, and crit = more insanity (As long as you took AS, if not ...) which again means more VF uptime. More VF uptime means more time with the damage buff, haste stacks, mass hysteria, and (terrible as it is) sphere of insanity.

Also haste is still useful at high VF stacks. You Don't reduce your GCD below 0.75 seconds after 100% haste, but you also get VB cooldown reduced, faster MB cast times (Meaning easier to actually stay in VF without losing too much insanity during the cast), more SWP and VE ticks (more damage dealt with them, more insanity generated with crit), more hits from mindbender (more insanity again) etc. Will you get high enough to really cap that out? Not really.

On a short fight, sure, mastery might come out on top.

[Djriff]

I agree that it seems odd that haste drops so far, so I can only hazard a guess as to the cause:

MH and mastery scale off of each other, so an increase in mastery doesn't really surprise me. Also, with StM you'll most likely have no issues staying in Void Form long enough to reach 100% haste (VF + regular haste), past which haste is useless (unless I'm mistaken, haste doesn't do anything past 100%). Crit on the other hand gives more insanity (allowing you to reach VF earlier and maintain it longer), but most of all, has great synergy with both mastery and MH. It's probably valued lower because of the variable nature (it's not guaranteed below 100% crit) and probably requires more rating per % than mastery does.

Let's also not forget that we're looking at a very binary list and don't see the actual stat weights. For all we know, the weights were already super close without StM, in which case it wouldn't take much to change the priority. Or it's simply the case that with StM the ratings are super close.

So long story short: I think the reason is that MH has a snowball effect on the scaling of mastery and crit. Due to the unique way StM works, it probably devalues haste because you'll drop out of VF a lot less per fight (or rather, you won't drop out +/- 2 mins before the end due to activating StM).

To word it differently: at 100 stacks of VF, mastery and crit are still valuable (even more so due to more ticks), but haste is not. Obviously it's not that black and white (it's not like you're instantly capped or can stay there very long), but it makes sense if StM allows you to spend huge chunks of the fight with 50+ stacks.

You pretty much hit the nail on the head. I can't remember the exact numbers that simcraft gave me, but mastery was pretty far ahead of crit which I found odd for the reasons you said above. I talked to twintop about it and he agreed that it made sense in pretty much the same way you explained it.

Haste is devalued with StM due to you hitting 100% haste with it. Add lust and haste procs into the mix and you can almost go full mastery/crit on your gear on super short fights. At the end of the day you'll probably be fine just swapping a few pieces out for StM on fights you'll know you get a great benefit from it ie farm or close to a kill.

[Deleted]

Thanks for your imput!

You can safely say Haste >= Crit > Mastery > Versatility.

Twintop 20160823 - Emerald Nightmare Stat Weights - Heroic

But, those sims are still without Mass Hysteria I guess?

[Blackmorgrim]

Those are Emerald Nightmare sims. 110 ilvl. Minimum nodes for all 3 gold traits. Relics give +10% MB, and +1% all shadow damage.

Haste overall is still pretty much your go to stat, do not worry about capping out, that is not an issue. If our 2pc remains the same going into live, the constant insanity from dots will pretty much leave haste as an uncontested first. The 22-25% haste cap is pretty much only a thing for prepatch since fights are so short.

Crit is pretty much your next secondary as long as you have AS or SI. If you take San'layn, mastery = crit.
Most of the time, except while maybe running world quests, you'll probably want to use AS.

[Rumstein]

Thanks for your imput!



But, those sims are still without Mass Hysteria I guess?

Nope, those include artifact traits.

[GT4]

I've done some extensive testing in simc (with some adjustments to the APL to avoid early deaths to S2M) and haste is certainly by far the strongest stat to stack (and even moreso with the artifact unlocked), especially when playing S2M. At low haste values, haste rating can even be up to 3 times as valuable as the second best secondary stat.

[Djriff]

I spoke to twintop about it, he confirmed there was a bug with StM that has been fixed. I'll be updating both of those guides this week in reference to that.