Balance mythic+ 8.3 struggle

[tehealadin]

I play a boomy and I feel you. My DPS is very inconsistent at times, overall it is usually between 45k-55k (ilvl 472). Been trying to play around with corruptions, had 2 TD rank 2's, but it is so hit and miss, some runs it is awesome, but most it barely procs, or when it does it is when most of the mobs in a group are dead so only hits 1 or 2. Ditched one of my TD corruptions and got 1 crit and infinite stars as they were on vendor, but I want a haste one and gushing wounds too, need to do some runs to see what difference it might make.

[oneclosetothesun]

Nice input thanks.
TD is big lottery, and having to give up on range is meh. That Honed Mind sounds interesting, so much bonus damage. Gonna try play again for a bit, with the corruption vendor FINALLY out.

I can't help it, but for some reason I really like boomie. It breaks my hearth, that I can't compete on DPS meter, due to such immensely poor balancing.

[KOUNTERPARTS]

I kind of despise being forced to talent into Fury of Elune for M+ in order to do decent AoE. But I suppose that's why it's there.

[apustus]

I didn't even bother stressing about AoE damage during the last push week (got just shy of 4.3k raider.io score). Didn't really bother using starfall except on a few pulls like the freehold first pull, instead just surging dangerous mobs like AD's augurs/confessors etc.

I played with 2x Gushing Wound, 1x Void Ritual rank 3 and 1x Expedient rank 3

[tehealadin]

I didn't even bother stressing about AoE damage during the last push week (got just shy of 4.3k raider.io score). Didn't really bother using starfall except on a few pulls like the freehold first pull, instead just surging dangerous mobs like AD's augurs/confessors etc.

I played with 2x Gushing Wound, 1x Void Ritual rank 3 and 1x Expedient rank 3

To be honest I have found that the cleave from the single target rotation can end up creating some pretty nice numbers. Not DH numbers, but pretty good, especially if the group can live long enough. I am like you, I rarely use starfall, the number of mobs needs to be really big, there aren't enough groups in dungeons for it to make sense most of the time.

One day I hope to get gushing wound.

[oneclosetothesun]

I just ran some hc parse raid, there was thicc CE boomie stacked with severe and crit dmg, maybe 1 expedient. Ranging 75-85% crit on streaking and starsurge after fight. top1 dps metter, with 6x fire mage stack behind him often times. Looked pretty strong, and I get the idea of scaling crit for it affects streaking. Thought I share, it was really strong, and we already ST only anyways, so it's not so much difference in raid vs dungeon.

[huth]

I just ran some hc parse raid, there was thicc CE boomie stacked with severe and crit dmg, maybe 1 expedient. Ranging 75-85% crit on streaking and starsurge after fight. top1 dps metter, with 6x fire mage stack behind him often times. Looked pretty strong, and I get the idea of scaling crit for it affects streaking. Thought I share, it was really strong, and we already ST only anyways, so it's not so much difference in raid vs dungeon.

Strikethrough is actually rather weak, even with very high crit. Expedient relatively quickly runs into major softcaps though, while Severe can go much higher.

GW should come up next week and still be fairly strong.

[oneclosetothesun]

Yeah, the haste. My problem with it, is that after you cap gcd, the only further scale is on dots, and there are thresholds. It doesn't feel that much of a deal. Unlike with DH for example, who gain lower cds from haste as well as increased proc on TD and similar corruptions (RPPM+haste=CD). I can only assume, that having more dot ticks is good on long trash fights, which must be like 20 and above key level around this time?
I think for boomie in particular the builds will vary depending on key level. Like you have players using vision of perfection in bellow 15 keys, while something like focusing iris would give them probably twice the overall dps.

[oneclosetothesun]

I am just gonna share some more info I learn.
Looking at top rank druids, majority is now playing around ~2x expedient ~4-5x severe ~0-2x strikethrough.

Overall in this order:
Severe (max max MAX MAX)
Expedient (2 max)
Strikethrough (seen 3 at most)

You still find more than few stacking expedient, so you could say, it's up to you. And then of course gushing wound or honed mind as filler, if no better(I find GW more appealing than striketrough).

[tehealadin]

I switched out IS for 2xgushing wound, regretting it. Previously was doing around 50-60k DPS, now its like 45-50k DPS, overall.

[majinbebi]

I was under the impression GW is usually better than IS, particularly in overall dmg in a m+ o.O

[huth]

I switched out IS for 2xgushing wound, regretting it. Previously was doing around 50-60k DPS, now its like 45-50k DPS, overall.

Against what? And what level of IS?

[tehealadin]

Against what? And what level of IS?

IS level 2. Against most dungeons, overall dps.

[KOUNTERPARTS]

Using IS in M+ dungeons is certainly a gamble. Perhaps on Tyrannical weeks it may be worth it but I've decided against running IS in M+ going forward. No guarantee for it to stack on the same target to be worth it.

[huth]

IS level 2. Against most dungeons, overall dps.

You swapped 50 corruption for 30 corruption. Of course that's going to be weaker. Though i'm questioning if you're really doing a valid comparison there. The more similar the situation, the better, and we won't have last weeks traits again for quite a while.

Using IS in M+ dungeons is certainly a gamble. Perhaps on Tyrannical weeks it may be worth it but I've decided against running IS in M+ going forward. No guarantee for it to stack on the same target to be worth it.

It's not just that, if there's a trash pack that is "in combat", IS may actually pull them, like the pack before Azerokk in Motherlode if you skip the way up. Wasn't very fun when they suddenly swarmed the healer.

[tehealadin]

You swapped 50 corruption for 30 corruption. Of course that's going to be weaker. Though i'm questioning if you're really doing a valid comparison there. The more similar the situation, the better, and we won't have last weeks traits again for quite a while.

I think the point I am trying to make, and didn't articulate all too well, is that I really am not sure what is what. I really wish that stuff would just be on the vendor to make experimenting easier, instead of having to wait up to 4 weeks to make adjustments, though that is a side issue.

I ditched IS2 because it didn't seem to really do anything, that included boss fights. Not sure if my details is bugged, and it just doesn't show properly, but the damage from it was minuscule, from memory GWx2 adds more damage, but my dps overall seems to have dipped. That was based off of running different mythics and looking at overall damage at the end. Might try to grind out some echoes and stick IS3 and ditch a GW.

My expedient isn't the best, rank 1 and 2, one was on gear, the other I bought when it appeared as I had none at the time, so I know that isn't optimal.

[huth]

My expedient isn't the best, rank 1 and 2, one was on gear, the other I bought when it appeared as I had none at the time, so I know that isn't optimal.

Keep in mind that we'll likely get Expedient 3 next reset.

Also, definitely consider that this may be due to different M+ affixes, not your own performance changing. Just running Mythics and comparing final numbers isn't all that good a measure.

[oneclosetothesun]

I bought some gushing wounds, drop me self a psyche shredder mythic with socket (booyeah) and finally become somewhat competitive after all that time. sitting on r3 exp r3 severe r2 race pulse and rest GW. Which is quiet mediocore, but it seem to do some job for a change.

Also I was trying both in sim and in game fury of elune vs soothing stars, soothing stars give me fairly more starsurges (and sim like 1% ish higher) but for some reason in game I have better results with fury of elune.

Can't wait for them expedient and severe for the final form.

[exochaft]

Also I was trying both in sim and in game fury of elune vs soothing stars, soothing stars give me fairly more starsurges (and sim like 1% ish higher) but for some reason in game I have better results with fury of elune.

The sims assume no downtime and a roughly fixed sim time, so there are some variables where FoE will come ahead. For example, if you're doing a M+, downtime between pulls makes FoE a stronger option because you'll likely have the ability on cooldown when you're not attacking anything. In a similar light, the ability is considered burst damage compared to Shooting Stars, so getting all that damage upfront means there's a breakpoint where SS would take over and give you a higher sim... but considering the damage difference, that breakpoint is close to when the cooldown of FoE ends. Basically, we can use FoE to min/max our damage more compared to SS because it's not random, and any downtime in combat makes FoE stronger.

- - - Updated - - -

Also, definitely consider that this may be due to different M+ affixes, not your own performance changing. Just running Mythics and comparing final numbers isn't all that good a measure.

Yes, there are soooo many variables that will affect a moonkin's damage output in a M+. For example, I was helping some friends out with two +19 ML keys, and my damage done was very different between the two keys solely based upon the comp alone. When your companion DPS goes from fire mage / ele shaman (with DH tank) to double DH DPS rocking TD/versa% corruptions... well, one can imagine how much lower my damage looked in the double DH run because of how quickly trash mobs died. My end-of-run meter DPS went from 90k DPS to 81k DPS, and the second run was slightly faster, too. Beyond that, how much was pulled, how long the trash mobs and bosses live, RNG of corruptions/procs, when your CD's line up with what's pulled, etc. all alter how much that end-of-run DPS meter looks. When I'm the stronger DPS in the group, my meters look really good... then double melee comes in and wrecks the trash so quickly that my meters look weaker.

It's been said before, but moonkins have a sort of 'sweet spot' where we perform better in M+. At lower keys and small pulls, we don't look that great because our DoT's can't do anything and our default cleave is pretty mediocre. On higher keys and larger pulls, we look much better because our DoT's can actually do damage. That's not to say you can beat an equally geared/skilled BM hunter or <insert OP melee>, but you feel like less of a burden compared to lower keys.

[huth]

The sims assume no downtime and a roughly fixed sim time, so there are some variables where FoE will come ahead.

For that matter, drop it below the default 5min duration and IS will rapidly drop.

- - - Updated - - -

It's been said before, but moonkins have a sort of 'sweet spot' where we perform better in M+. At lower keys and small pulls, we don't look that great because our DoT's can't do anything and our default cleave is pretty mediocre. On higher keys and larger pulls, we look much better because our DoT's can actually do damage. That's not to say you can beat an equally geared/skilled BM hunter or <insert OP melee>, but you feel like less of a burden compared to lower keys.

It basically comes down to us being good at sustained damage, but not very at short-term burst AoE.