DK DPS 2t10 choice

[Aelobin]

I'm having trouble deciding on which 2 slots to switch out for t10hc to sim the 2set bonus. Not sure if the link to this Wowhead comparison will work as it's so long, but if not I've included a screenshot below: Item Comparison Tool - World of Warcraft

The base profile is this one and the replacements (from left to right) are: Chest, Shoulders, Legs, Head, Gloves. The head includes a 3% crit damage meta, the top score is the default Wowhead frost weightings and the bottom score is the weightings with hit removed.

Any input would be appreciated

 

[Splosion]

Quick question about that chardev; Why Gendarmane's cuirass? Sure it has more str, but the other itemisation leaves much to be desired (I had considered it for my retribution BiS chardev, but it turned out that the tier was better, simply because it provided haste).

My first choice would be gloves and helm. Reason being, the 3% crit damage meta provides a 6% damage boost to crits (it gains the +100% bonus a crit gets), so is likely worth more than the mastery on the 308. Gloves are simple. There are no 300+ ilevel str gloves, and as such the best we can get is the redsteel gauntlets, which only permit an enchant of +44 ap (or 10 haste, lul). This means the 277 tier gloves are much closer, despite the itemisation (hit/crit if I remember, but I could be wrong).

My second choice (if you did not want to drop the mastery from the 308 helm, the trade is quite large for a meta (~100 mastery and quite a lot of str) would be legs/gloves. Reasoning for this is that the non-set legs (whilst fairly awesome), do not provide mastery innately, and as such can be swapped out with (less) of a loss compared to say...Shoulders, which are near-perfect itemisation. The legs are crit/expertise, which again is an issue (damn accuracy stats), but I think you might end up better off for it.

Finally, my third choice would be to use chest/gloves, because you are likely to end up gaining itemisation for this. The tier chest is crit/haste, whilst the Cuirass is crit/hit, and like I mentioned earlier, haste is a decent enough reason for not using the offset 277. Personally, I'd think this option is the better one (certainly better than the 2nd choice I mentioned above), just because of how strong haste is for a level 80 dk.

Overall, I doubt there is any competition for the first piece of tier (gloves), just because we can't really get a decent alternative (Fleshrending gauntlets are good, but I don't think crit/haste itemisation makes up for no set bonus. Shoulders aren't really worth it, because the 308 have very good itemisation, and you are likely make better use of the pieces elsewhere.

Feel free to math in contradiction, but that's just my initial observations.

 

[Aelobin]

My mind has gone through so many iterations of which item to choose for each slot, I've lost track of my reasoning for most of them xD
I've done some rough chardevs+sims (only self buffs, some light movement and other less-optimal options) and this is what I got:

Shadowmourne
- 2t10: 10,218dps
- Normal: 10,273dps
- Shadowfrost: 8922dps
Whitefin
- Normal: 10,478dps
DW
- 2t10: 10,879dps
- Normal: 10,842dps

The 2t10 doesn't seem to have been included, nor the Shadowmourne procs. What have I learnt from this?
- DW is better than 2h unless the SM proc can make up 569-661 dps
- The 2t10 is worth taking as Obliterate did 2768-3341 dps (10% of which is a lot greater than the dps lost through stats)
- Shadowfrost is only viable if there's at least 1 extra mob present for the entire fight
- Edit: Oh and the SM proc needs to be 205+ dps for it to beat Whitefin

 

[Splosion]

- Edit: Oh and the SM proc needs to be 205+ dps for it to beat Whitefin

This is quite possible. Ret paladins back at 80 could gain a 400 dps increase just for canceling the str proc (after the explosion, not the static one). I'd say you'd end up with better damage using the orange.

 

[Falkor]

400 dps increase for losing a str proc? im confused

but anyways for a ret whitefin is probably better w/ landslide than smourne w/ gems n zerk/ap chant (not that it deters me from wanting smourne on my ret) but for dks smourne could be better with the gems, proc, and fallen crusader. its gotta be a close call

 

[Splosion]

400 dps increase for losing a str proc? im confused

Back when, because rets stacked it so fast, the stacking proc + aoe damage at the end > static 270 str proc.

It's not possible to do it now though (at least, I don't think so).

 

[Lepidosteus]

400 dps increase for losing a str proc? im confused

but anyways for a ret whitefin is probably better w/ landslide than smourne w/ gems n zerk/ap chant (not that it deters me from wanting smourne on my ret) but for dks smourne could be better with the gems, proc, and fallen crusader. its gotta be a close call

Unholy mastery increases the shadow damage done by Shadowmourne, so that should put it infront of Whitefin for them UH DKs.

 

[Splosion]

Unholy mastery increases the shadow damage done by Shadowmourne, so that should put it infront of Whitefin for them UH DKs.

Only the chaos bane proc, which isn't much. But I'm sure that over a long amount of time (a boss fight), the str procs and chaos bane end up being more dps, even without landslide.

 

[Aelobin]

Only the chaos bane proc, which isn't much. But I'm sure that over a long amount of time (a boss fight), the str procs and chaos bane end up being more dps, even without landslide.

Guessing the UH baseline +25% str would effect the buff part of SM too. Problem is my 80 UH DK sim only showed 6.6k dps, which makes me think simcraft must be bugged or something.

 

[Splosion]

Guessing the UH baseline +25% str would effect the buff part of SM too. Problem is my 80 UH DK sim only showed 6.6k dps, which makes me think simcraft must be bugged or something.

Quite likely, the only thing you miss is outbreak.

 

[Aelobin]

Ok I found the problem. It was me being derp by forgetting to set the target level to 83 and not removing another reference to outbreak in the the UH action list. These are the new (fixed) results:

Frost (2h)
- Shadowmourne: 13,874 dps
- SM+2t10: 14,146 dps (13,845+301)
- SM+Shadowfrost: 14,028 dps
- Whitefin: 14,147 dps

Frost (DW)
- Agi Axes: 14,478 dps
- Agi Axes+2t10: 14,845 dps (14,498+347)

Unholy
- Shadowmourne: 15,353 dps
- SM+2t10: 15,681 dps (15,281+400)
- Whitefin: 15,471 dps


Which tells me the following:
- Unholy > Frost
- Always take the 2t10 bonus
- If going Frost: DW > 2h > SF. However, if the SM proc is worth 699+ dps then 2h overtakes DW, and SF too at 817+ dps.
- Take SM over WF if the proc is worth 118+ dps (Unholy) or 273+ dps (2h Frost).

 

[Zmirnøff]

[03:30:58] [G] [80:Aelobin]: I R FERYKRAFTA

Yes, yes you are.

Best DK EU still prefers frost.

 

[Xipe]

tsk you'll neva be best shammy eu thats for sure

 

[Zmirnøff]

Ya never know Xipe, Might twink out my 80 shammy in MoP if we get more char slots.

 

[Aelobin]

Just spent about 4 hours doing some target dummy tests with different weapons/reforges. Each 'fight' lasts around 5-8mins, and is done self-buffed in the same (full Cata) gear with a Frost spec. I haven't tested Unholy, 2t10 or DBW yet.

Weapon	Reforges	Attempt 1 DPS	Attempt 2 DPS	Average DPS	Max DPS
Shadowmourne	Mastery Stacked	11,910.5	11,378.7	11,644.6	11,910.5
Shadowmourne	Mastery Stacked (with /cancelaura macro)	11,731.0	11,195.4	11,463.2	11,731.0
Shadowmourne	Haste Stacked	11,139.4	11,197.1	11,168.3	11,197.1
Shadowmourne	Haste Stacked (with /cancelaura macro)	11,887.4	11,763.7	11,825.6	11,887.4
Whitefin	Mastery Stacked	11,659.7	11,283.2	11,471.5	11,659.7
Whitefin	Haste Stacked	11,241.2	11,764.3	11,502.8	11,764.3
Dual Wield	Mastery Stacked	11,116.2	11,160.3	11,138.3	11,160.3
Dual Wield	Haste Stacked	11,179.5	11,642.4	11,411.0	11,642.4

From those results, I'm thinking the best DPS option would be SM + Haste + /cancelaura (highest average dps and the max DPS was only 23.1 behind the highest).

Other findings:
- 2h seems to out-dps DW
- Average 2h dps order: SM+Haste+CA > SM+Mast > WF+Haste > WF+Mast > SM+Mast+CA > SM+Haste
- It's a dps gain to cancel the SM buff when haste stacking, but not when mastery stacking

 

[Vaxyo]

Do you know of any mod that is able to auto-cancel Chaos Bane? I looked around but FreeMe doesn't seem to be working any more, and I'm just guessing that a mod will improve dps slightly over macro'ing /cancelaura to most binds.

 

[Nesyla]

Do you know of any mod that is able to auto-cancel Chaos Bane? I looked around but FreeMe doesn't seem to be working any more, and I'm just guessing that a mod will improve dps slightly over macro'ing /cancelaura to most binds.

Q&A.

Might help.

 

[Vaxyo]

As I'm saying, FreeMe doesn't work for me, and latest update is for 3.2

 

[Nesyla]

As I'm saying, FreeMe doesn't work for me, and latest update is for 3.2

My bad, diden't read carefully enought. I'll look around and see if i can come up with anything else to help.

 

[Splosion]

You don't use a mod anymore, you just macro /cancelaura Chaos Bane to everything. There was barely a dps gain anyway, it was easy to install an addon.