Haste, Gems, and Understanding your Toon

by on Nov.16, 2010, under General

With the change to Sunfire, I began looking over my gear to see if I could make any more changes to min/max.

Now, the standard methodology is that spell power (intellect) is always far superior to haste.  This is not ALWAYS the case, and you need to understand your mechanics to see why.

First, let me post the haste to DoT chart, as provided by Hamlet over at Elitist Jerks.

Assuming we have 3/3 Genesis, and Moonkin Form:

Tick 11: 365 Haste

Tick 12: 712 Haste

Tick 13: 1059 Haste

Tick 14: 1406 Haste

With Nature’s Grace:

Tick 13: 493 Haste

Tick 14: 795 Haste

Tick 15: 1097 Haste

Tick 16: 1398 Haste

Looking over my toon, I realized I was at 1369 haste, and by simply changing out 4 +20 Intellect gems, I would be adding a tick to both DoTs in my rotation.  This is a clear DPS increase (as supported by WrathCalcs), despite it breaking the standard convention of Int > Haste.



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13 Comments for this entry

  • Chris
    November 16th, 2010 on 2:43 pm

    Are you sure you are not clipping your dots though at that high rates of haste?
    Of course your theory can be easily proved to be wrong considering there will almost be no fights where it won’t be needed to move and thus spamming MF/SF

    Reply
    • Sunfyre
      November 16th, 2010 on 5:00 pm

      I’m just on the edge of clipping. I don’t. And how does movement prove my theory wrong? Adding in movement would just allow you to ensure that you actually do get your extra tick on the end because you’re having longer duration between Eclipse, you’re also not spamming Insect Swarm on the move.

      Reply
  • Chris
    November 16th, 2010 on 5:17 pm

    what i meant is that you might need (and you probably will) to spam some MFs let’s say just after an eclipse ends….. so aren’t you losing the haste benefit for the extra tick in that case since you will clip it shortly after the next eclipse which is near?

    Reply
    • Sunfyre
      November 16th, 2010 on 5:19 pm

      Of course, but that’d probably happen if my moonfire only did 9 ticks too, so with that argument, why stack haste at all?

      Reply
      • Chris
        November 16th, 2010 on 5:27 pm

        that is true. The thing is you probably end up benefiting more from intellect since on a real basis spamming MFs only benefits from intellect. So isn’t this a good reason to still prefer int over haste?
        It seems quite confusing when you are trying to think of a boss fight and your REAL chances to get benefit of a full MF/SF duration for all the fight.

        Reply
        • Sunfyre
          November 16th, 2010 on 5:29 pm

          Um, there’s always going to be a tick at the very end of moonfire no matter what your haste, I’m just going to fit more dot ticks in the time that I’m NOT clipping. And there’s plenty of fights where you get full duration DoT ticks into. (And again, insect swarm is also gaining from this haste and is not being clipped. Ever.)

          Reply
  • Chris
    November 16th, 2010 on 5:38 pm

    well it’s one more thing to have in mind, that’s what i mean. Checking your haste to see if it’s any close to the next “extra tick” and react respectively.

    P.S Just followed you on twitter, good to see you there too :-)

    Reply
  • paperclip
    November 16th, 2010 on 6:22 pm

    The new hasted dot/hot calculations are really complicated. I know other classes not only have to worry about the extra tick, but also the changed duration which can vary up to a tick period. Cynwise, over at “Cynwise’s Battlefield Manual” had a writeup regarding warlock dots. Ideally, as moonkin, we need to time nuke casts, starsurge cooldown and eclipse procs to fit with dot refreshes. I’m not saying you’re wrong, just that it is more complicated than just the extra tick.

    One possibility to consider though, if you can get the haste through reforging (which doesn’t allow intellect), you can reach your target and keep your gems for intellect.

    Reply
    • Sunfyre
      November 16th, 2010 on 6:29 pm

      My DoTs fall off JUST as I’m about to proc a new Eclipse, so I’m not too worried right now. Unfortunately, I’ve already reforged everything to haste, so there’s not much more I can squeeze. If I can manage to get the Leather of Stiched Scourge Parts, I’ll be able to re-gem again. (I really don’t care for the 4PC T10 anymore because of the Eclipse change, and I’d prefer hit(spirit)/haste (with a reforge of crit) over hit/crit (with a reforge of haste).

      Reply
  • Markus
    November 16th, 2010 on 8:02 pm

    What is the rough calculation to figure out at what haste your dots gain extra ticks?
    Might be worth to have in mind if you can grab even an extra tick by having the Black Magic proc + Engineering gloves before you cast the dots at 1406 or more haste.

    Reply
  • Fearon
    November 19th, 2010 on 1:51 am

    Where can i find the value’s for level 85?

    Reply

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