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Wednesday, April 8, 2009

Rotation study (Blogsourcing)

Synopsis
Since I had so much trouble with the 12 second mangle rotation I tried some more and this is what I found.


I started out dpssing, again on a lvl 80 dummy, and not berserking ever. Berserk will screw up whatever you are able to call a "rotation".

This is the DPS is did over a LONG time (calculated form white damage hits it is 45 minutes).


At the start I was at 3450, that then got to 3650. It went a bit down after some screwups in rotation, but it is a good average. 3.1 PTR servers are in America. Meaning that I did suffer a bit from latency. Renewing Rip and Rake had to be calculated. Do it at 0.5 seconds left, not too soon or the last tick won't get through, not too late or there is a too long period without Rake/Rip.

Below I will tell you what rules I tried to dps by which resulted in this. I ask you the same, if you are possible and willing. Tell me what you found on ptr (not using Mangle glyph). Don't Berserk and upload a screenshot (or post it on you own blog) and link it in as a comment. Judging from white hit damage there is a good comparison to what your total dps to mine would be. If yours is higher i'll try to find out why.

The rules I tried to live by:
Ability strategy:
  • SR always up. If it is down and have no CP get 1 CP SR up at least. Then depending on Rip uptime do a 4/5 CP SR.
  • Mangle over Rake. Rake does nice damage but Rip does a lot more. Mangle increases that with 30%. Mangle doesn't always have to drop before renewing.
  • FB is overrated. It doesn't always crit. Rather keep the 5 CP to keep up SR and Rip then to let one of those drp.
  • SR > Rip > Mangle > Rake
Energy strategy:
  • WAIT! If SR, Rip, Mangle and Rake are up you have all the time of the world. Stock up on energy. Don't let it get too high because OoC procs a lot now. You should spend as little time as possible at 100 energy. (I'd like to be rogue and have 110 or 120 energy to have more time.)
  • Don't get to 5 CP asap. Wait to see what happens. If Mangle and Rake need a refresh soon, stop at 2/3/4 CP, get engery refresh en and then wait for SR or Rip to drop to renew it.
CP Strategy:
  • Try to go for 3CP SR. It is about the same time Rip takes. That is a way to go for a normalisation in Rotation. It will not always hold up and you are seldom able to do it, but it if the choise it is available do that. You will have max time to be ready to renew Rip (where a 2CP SR could have the SR needing refreshing before Rip. Als a 3CP SR gives you that little extra time to build a new 3CP SR after you have renewed Rip.
  • The 3 ways to spend CP are SR, Rip and FB. FB should be avoided as much as possible. Saving up on energy and Mangle + Rake to get to 5CP might leave you with a lot of energy (having OoC).
  • When to FB? Only when you have plenty of time left on Rip and SR. I find that to be about 12-14 seconds. It will not ensure having SR and Rip up 100% of the time, but the alternatives are worse. (As you see in 45 minutes I only did FB 33 times vs the 4 per 3 minutes I did before, not counting the extra FB I did after a Berserk).
  • When not to FB: 1: Less then 12-14 seconds on SR only. Wait till the last moment (is having 100 energy) and refresh SR. If Mangle and Rake both drop, do it earlier. so Mangle and Rake are not of or at least not a long time. It is worth it to wait for 70 energy to be able to SR + Mangle + Rake immediately as a combo.
  • When not to FB: 2: Less then 12-14 seconds on Rip only. The same as above. Try to avoid this situation. With high time left on Rip (10 sec) you should get the last of the 5 CP's from Mangle and Rake so you dont have them down or are forced to do an early Rip to refresh Mangle + Rake
  • When not to FB: 3: Less then 12-14 seconds left on both, Rip to expire before SR. Wait till rip is expired and refresh. 1CP SR (or more if possible) right after.
  • When not to FB: 4: Less then 12-14 seconds left on both, SR Expires before Rip. Depends on how long the difference is. If the difference is up 3 seconds you can refresh Rip just before SR drops. (Then 1CPSR after). If the difference is higher, refresh SR immediately (overwriting 10 seconds or so) and use the remaining seconds to get 5CP Rip asap.
This is kinda it. Would love to hear your input and see your tests.
PS, this is not a strategy I did when testing on live (3.0.8) servers. So applying this strategy on live servers can not be compared to my previously posted live dps test.

7 comments:

  1. I did about 5 minutes of testing on ptr. I replaced the shred glyph with mangle one as it was so much easier to keep the rotation up in my opinion. I didint't use berserk either. My dps was 3940. Our % of each skill dmg done seems to be about the same.

    http://img17.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dpstest.jpg

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  2. Thanks a lot anon!
    Based on your data I have made a few conclusions, however I must warn they are pure speculative. But I think they might be coming close to the truth.

    From the data I have collected the following:
    Your average damage per white hit was 932. Mine is 878. So your gear is somewhat better (I am guessing you have Journey's End).
    My dps = 3646/878 = 4.15 x white dps.
    Your dps = 3940/932 = 4.23 x white dps.

    I think this can indeed be credited to you using the mangle glyph. We haven't compared talents but I think they are close at least if not the same.

    So the dps output from the glyphs is nearly the same. However for the main part of raiding shred > mangle. True mangle does more dps because of the easier rotation, but when raiding there is a fair chance you have an other druid (preferably bear) or an arms warrior (since they are buffing arms in 3.1). Mangle would be totally wasted there and you would get so much more out of shred.

    But still, it all depends. If you are the only druid and there is no arms warrior and you really need the dps since it is a progress boss... you should use the mangle glyph. So have a few of those lying around just in case.

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  3. I indeed have JE, witch is about 200+ dps boost i think. the spec i used was http://ptr.wowhead.com/?talent=0ZxGMsfrzoeR0huAkbAczb.

    We have another feral druid in the guild, so i have been thinking of getting lots of shred/rip and mangle glyphs when 3.1 hits and changing them depending on the raid comp, i also been thinking of making 2 same dps specs with just different glyphs, depending how my tanking is needed, but i doubt i will do that.

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  4. Yeah it is a weird thing to say to your raidleader.. ehm my specs are feral dps and feral dps... I can't tank sorry. ;)

    In specs I used the exact same with the only difference being that the 2 point from Survival Instincts and Nurturing Instinct are in Feral Agression with me, boosting my FB's a bit.

    And indeed depending on raid composition the shred/mangle glyph is the thing to do imo.

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  5. not to bad, but a few things wrong, you said spend as little tim as posible at 100 energy, NEVER spend ANY time at 100 energy, if you get there and waiting, thor win an extra shred

    refresh bleeds at 0.5 seconds, the last tick on the bleed is at 0 seconds, wait for the last tick and refresh as soon as it ticks so no damage is wasted

    DarkIron horde feral druid - 5k dps

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  6. PS
    If you haev the shred glyph, dont spam shred when rip is up, use it once every 2 seconds(every rip tick) to get the full bonus, :)
    unless you have full energy, and OOC procs of course

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  7. Good tips.
    And it all depends on the time you spent at 100 energy. If it is 0.5 seconds I think the 1.5 (50% crit) cp you get to do the shred after outweighs the 5 energy lost.

    No idea where the tipping point would be. Meaning how long time spent at 100 energy is too much time? I do not agree that 0 time spent at 100 energy is optimal.

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