| reply to cigtyme
from elitist jerks:
Specs
Cookie Cutter Build is 7/2/(29+2) + 1. There are two optional points in Retribution necessary to reach Zealotry. Then there is one more optional point which can be placed in any tree.
In the demo above the Retribution points were placed into Eye for an Eye as it has been proven to provide slim PvE DPS depending on boss mechanics (random targeted non-AOE spells) and Sacred Shield as a huge add to PvE or PvP survivability. Some choose both points in E4E to absolutely maximize possible DPS. Other talents are utility, such as Guardian's Favor. There are no wrong choices for these points.
The final optional point may be placed in any tree. I personally feel Divinity is never a bad choice. Alternately, this talent point could be used to gain the second tier of a Ret talent you selected for the first optional point (2/2 E4E would be another small DPS increase on some bosses, or Sacred Shield if you already went 2/2 E4E).
Note: Eye for an Eye has been proven to proc from direct magic damage and some untargeted spells. Examples are Shadow Nova from Halfus Wyrmbreaker and Scorching Breath from his Proto-Behemoth, Twilight Blast from the Double Dragons, Magma Spit from Magmaw, Arcane Storm from Maloriak, and so on. Passive auras, such as Blood Queen Lana'thel's from Icecrown Citadel, are not eligible for reflection.
A reasonable number of fights have damage which can reflect. While this is not a large volume of damage, it is still an overall DPS increase to talent E4E. The overall impact is minor - increased utility via another talent is a perfectly valid choice.
Honourable Mention: Acts of Sacrifice - with only one point invested into it, Cleanse will remove ALL snares or immobilizes regardless of debuff type, from Hamstring to Curse of Exhaustion to Feral Charge. This could have raid benefits.
Selfless Healer
Selfless healer is universally a loss of DPS. The bonus % will partially mitigate the loss, but it can never be used for an overall gain of total DPS. A single TV is worth more total damage than a small boost to other attacks for a short time period.
You lose 3 HP from using the Word of Glory itself. You lose around 1 second to the GCD from Word of Glory. To gain DPS you would need to overcome the loss of the TV in 10-11 seconds. Every best-case scenario attempting to model this has shown a loss and the majority of field conditions would be far below best-case scenario.
4.2 Selfless Healer reduces the CD on WoG to 10 seconds, so it is again theoretically possible to sustain 100% up-time, albeit unlikely.
If you wish to discuss this and push forward the theory that Selfless Healer is a DPS increase, you must bring hard math to the table to defend your viewpoint.
Glyphs
Prime
Glyph of Crusader Strike
Glyph of Exorcism
Glyph of Judgement
Glyph of Seal of Truth
Glyph of Templar's Verdict
Prime Glyphs all directly impact DPS. The Glyph of SoT appears to be the greatest gain as a free 10 Expertise (300.27 Expertise Rating).
If you are over the Expertise cap, reforge Expertise off of gear in order to utilize the GoSoT to the utmost - see reforging below.
Notes:
•Glyph of Templar's Verdict only provides ~11.5% increase, not 15% increase. This is because it is additive with Crusade (1.3 + 1.15 = 1.45) not multiplicative (1.3 * 1.15 = 1.495). It is still our 2nd best Glyph.
•Glyph of Exorcism will overwrite ("refresh" via log) on new application if re-cast during the duration of the DoT (unused ticks are lost). This rarely occurs and in most (possibly all) cases you receive at least 4 ticks after the refresh. At most you lose 2 ticks on the refresh and in many cases you only lose 1 tick, as the first tick occurs before the new cast refreshes.
•Note: Glyph of Exorcism inherits Exorcism's ability to auto-crit against Undead and Demons. All ticks generated from the Glyph will crit on Demon or Undead targets.
•Note: Glyph of SoT changed in 4.2 to also provides expertise while using SoR, so even in AOE situations you do not lose the Expertise.
Assessment
GoSoT is the best Glyph.
GoTV is the second best Glyph.
GoExo is presently superior to GoCS. As weapons scale across the expansion, it is possible that GoCS could match or pull ahead in a future tier. Through Dragon Soul Heroic gear GoExo is still superior.
Major
•Glyph of Consecration
•Glyph of Divine Plea
•Glyph of Divine Protection
•Glyph of Divinity
•Glyph of Hammer of Wrath
•Glyph of Holy Wrath
•Glyph of Lay on Hands
•Glyph of Rebuke
•Glyph of the Ascetic Crusader
No Major Glyph directly increases DPS. Several Major Glyphs impact mana usage. Manipulation of this mana reduction could possibly provide further Consecration usage or make up for loss of JotW from reduced Judgement usage. Ascetic Crusader appears the largest gain in this regard. All others are optional.
With HoW buffed it is now used under AW. This could cause a mana drain. Glyph of HoW would prevent any issues and could be considered useful in the same fashion as Ascetic Crusader.
In a fight which requires heavy interrupt usage, Glyph of Rebuke is a remarkable mana savings.
In a fight with regular magical damage spikes (nearly all of them) the Glyph of Divine Protection can increase survivability/make your healers' jobs easier.
Assessment
GoAC is greatest persistent mana usage mitigation.
GoHoW is excellent mana usage mitigation for AW and sub-20% phases.
GoRebuke or GoDivProt should be swapped on a per-fight basis depending on the necessity of interrupts.
Minor
•Glyph of Blessing of Kings
•Glyph of Blessing of Might
•Glyph of Insight
•Glyph of Justice
•Glyph of Righteousness
•Glyph of Truth
Assessment
In theory, Minors don’t impact DPS or mid-fight mana usage. In practice, if there is a necessity to seal swap between SoT and SoR for phases, you would get mana savings by utilizing the Glyphs of Righteousness and Truth. Saved mana means more to be used directly for DPS purposes (even one more Consecration in a fight is a DPS gain).
Rotation
Single Target
The Ret paladin "rotation" shares something with Wrath - it is priority based. The priority for single-target is one of the following:
Inq > CS > HoW > Exo > TV > J > HW > Cons
Inq > CS > TV > HoW > Exo > J > HW > Cons
Use the sequence which is more advantageous for your own gear. Both spreadsheets presently recommend the first for at least high end gear sets.
Against Undead/Demons the positions of HoW and Exo swap, providing:
Inq > CS > TV > Exo > HoW > J > HW > Cons, or
Inq > CS > Exo > HoW > TV > J > HW > Cons
The fact that Exorcism auto-crits when used on Undead or Demons and is faster scaling (lesser coefficient modified by large +% bonus, effectively granting higher overall coefficient) causes it to pull ahead of HoW in that scenario.
In both scenarios you do not perform a CS if you have 3 HP, however if you have 2 or less HP and a DivPurp proc you would use the CS before the free TV.
Inq increases Holy Damage when it is up. Modeling and testing shows to begin expecting to refresh at 3 seconds before it ends. You will rarely have Inq expire and those occasions when it does it should only be missing for 2-3 seconds.
In melee range:
Never, ever cast Exo - only use Exo when it is instant from an AoW proc. If AoW has not procced, then Exo has a cast time, mana cost, and vastly reduced damage. Remember during a cast you stop and reset all autoattacks.
If out of melee range (phase transition/funny-business):
Judge if you can. Without AoW Exo drops below Judge. If Judge is on CD, spam cast Exo as mana permits. Do not overcommit on Exo mana usage - ensure you have sufficient mana to Judge for mana regen and CS as soon as you reach target. This is a good time to use Divine Plea to regen sufficient mana for a few extra Exo or to ensure sufficient mana to Judge/CS on fight resumption.
Multiple Target
The AoE rotation is rather similar to single-target, simply replace Crusader Strike with Divine Storm. The rest of the priority stays the same. With Holy Wrath fixed to meteor properly, at 3 targets you should begin using Consecration over HW.
Redcape's modeling shows you should only swap to AoE rotation at 5 or more targets. A more recent test here receives the same results in 4.0.6. 4.1 likely drops this down to 4 targets. If DS successfully hits 4 targets it generates HP, making up the large gap it has had in the past. At hit/expertise cap for Bosses you should have only a slim chance to be parried by an 86/87 (most adds are not skulls), even if they are facing you.
4.2 - My own analysis shows 4 targets is the breakpoint. At 4 targets DS will generate HP, so you do not lose any HP generation. Additionally at 4 targets the additional procs from SoR surpass Censure ticks and the extra SoC procs which are generated from SoT. Thus swapping seals will produce more overall DPS, though less DPS on a single target - if damaging the boss remains the utmost factor it can still be superior to keep SoT running during AOE-cleave phases.
Zealotry
Zealotry provides a special circumstance. During Zealotry all CS earn 3 HP. Your rotation will become CS, TV, Filler, or CS, Filler, TV, as we still use 2 fillers between CS.
With current values for HoW and Exo they may be used over a CS or TV during Zealotry (see priorities above). Continue to follow your core priority sequence in and out of cooldowns. Zealotry does not alter your priority sequence, it just gives you more TV to socket in there.
Try to avoid use of Zealotry during AOE-cleave phases. Divine Storm does not produce 3 HP, so you would lose the benefit of this CD or lose the benefit of proper AOE attacks against available targets.
Stats and Gearing
Stat Weights
Redcape's stat weights are here.
My spreadsheet can provide specific stat weights based on your present gear, talents, glyphs, raid buffs, etc. I highly recommend individuals producing their own stat weights rather than relying on some single external value.
Stat Weights float in relation to one another. A solid example are Crit and Mastery. Self-buffed, Crit is more valuable than Mastery: one point of Crit Rating provides more DPS than one point of Mastery Rating. However, once you add in raid buffs (5% Crit aura, MoW/Kings for 5% Agi->Crit) you gain enough Crit that additional Mastery is now superior: one point of Mastery Rating provides more DPS than one point of Crit Rating. Following some single value could have you seeking the incorrect stat for your circumstances.
Crit vs Haste
It's definitive that Str is our best core stat and Mastery is our best Rating stat (once Hit/Exp capped). This leaves Crit and Haste to fight for the Silver medal.
Simcraft reckons that Crit > Haste.
My spreadsheet reckons that Haste > Crit by about the same ratio.
sjogren and I have compared the tools and do not find an overt flaw. We have amicably agreed to let the tools disagree.
This leads to the Crit vs Haste debate becoming a personal choice. It is up to the individual to decide whether they want Mastery > Crit > Haste or Mastery > Haste > Crit. Reforge to whichever view you decide to back or to match the tool you prefer. Alternately seek some threshold of one stat dedicating further points to the other, or seek some level of balance.
Bottom line, the RNG has more impact on our daily results than you will receive from favouring Crit or Haste. Do not expect a definitive answer in the near future, either from tools or empirical testing.
In General
•Str is king. No rating even approaches the DPS gain of 1 more Str.
•Cap Hit and Expertise via reforging (not gems).
•There is an inflection point where you have enough Mastery that more Crit/Haste pulls ahead. At present gear levels and with raid buffs it is possible to push beyond the Mastery inflection point. Even though gear can push beyond the inflection, it is not very far beyond and a single reforge can swing you back below inflection. Specific tests have only shown 1-5 DPS gain from more detailed reforging. It's perfectly safe to follow a blanket rule of Mastery > Crit/Haste.
Reforging
Reforging allows you to exchange 40% of a combat rating already on an item and converts it into a combat rating not already on an item. Example: If an item has Crit, you cannot add more Crit, if it has no Crit then you could reforge 40% of another rating (Expertise, Haste, Hit, or Mastery) into Crit. An item with 100 Hit and no Crit could be reforged to 60 Hit and 40 Crit.
Since we cannot reforge any stat into Str, then we focus on our most important stats.
These are your goals, in order.
Hit cap. Under hit cap, reforge the worst* stat into hit.
Expertise cap. If hit capped and under expertise cap, reforge your worst* stat into expertise.
Next best stat. If you are now hit and expertise capped and you have gear that has not been reforged, aim to reforge inferior stats to superior stats.
* Worst is relative. Generally reforging to Hit or Expertise is a good thing, but you can go further in-depth with reforging. For maximum DPS gain either carefully perform math on your gear to most closely reach Hit and Expertise caps (inverse "Price is Right" rules - closest over the cap wins), or use a website/program (such as Rawr, my spreadsheet, or WoW Reforge Calculator & Optimizer) which will offer reforging advice. Reforging Item A from Hit to something else and Item B from something else to Hit may permit values closer to Hit/Exp cap, thus permitting a few additional Rating to Crit, Mastery, and Haste - an overall minor DPS gain.
[top]Set Bonuses
•[T13 2P] Your Judgement ability now also generates 1 Holy Power.
•[T13 4P] While Zealotry is active your abilities deal 18% more damage.
•[T12 2P] Your Crusader Strike deals 15% additional damage as Fire damage over 4 sec.
•[T12 4P] Increases the duration of your Zealotry ability by 15 sec.
•[T11 2P] Increases the damage done by your Templar's Verdict by 10%.
•[T11 4P] Your Inquisition ability's duration is calculated as if you had one additional Holy Power.
T13
Generation of Holy Power from Judgement will ease refreshing Inq at all times, but may make the flow of HP feel unusual compared to 4.0 to present - you will have more finishing moves at your fingertips.
Testing has found that only active abilities gain this bonus. Autoattack and Censure ticks do not increase during Zealotry.
Breaking 4T12 means you will go back to GoAK, 10 seconds, Zealotry+AW as the best usage of cooldowns. Stacking Zealotry and AW will be even more advantageous with 4T13, as the 20% and 18% should be multiplicative.
T12
Blizzard has stated that tier bonuses will not lose damage from clipping. If a CS is performed within 4 seconds of the last CS, then the new ticks will be a combination of remainder + fresh.
Example: A CS hits for 1000 damage (easy number). Tier bonus produces a 150 DoT with 2 ticks of 75. You perform a second 1000 damage CS 3 seconds after the first. You have 75 damage remaining and a new 150, total 225. You will now see ticks of 112 and 113. (150 + 150) = 300 = (112 + 113 + 75).
Extended Zealotry increases our burn-time, producing more TV usage. Additionally it permits all of GoAK to be used with Zealotry. Proposed best order is Zealotry, pause 5 seconds, GoAK, pause 5 seconds, Golemblood Potion, Pause 5 seconds, and AW. If Golemblood is on CD then there is a 10 second pause between GoAK and AW.
T11
Templar's Verdict is around 20% of our total DPS. Thus a 10% gain is approximately a 2% overall DPS boost.
Inquisition lasting an additional 10 seconds provides more Holy Power for TV usage. Using Inq at 1 HP is the greatest gain of HP (100% greater length Inq, compared to 3 HP and 33% greater length), but the greatest loss of GCD. Since letting Inq drop off is a DPS loss, and many refreshes clip Inq by 3-4 seconds (losing a fair portion of the bonus time), the best method is to refresh in the 0-3 second range with presently available HP (1 or 2 - if you have 3 at 3 seconds you can TV, then CS for 1 HP). Occasionally you will be "trapped" into a 3 HP Inq (typically via chain DivPurp procs as Inq is expiring), this is still a DPS increase and it would be better to refresh Inq for 40 seconds than let it expire.
Theory: If Tier item budget is equal to other items of the same iLevel (it appears to be), then the free bonuses should always make 4 piece worthwhile - issues with itemization can be addressed via reforging. If Tier items lose budget to account for bonuses (they do not appear to do so), then bonuses must be worthwhile to make up for lost stats.
So far this theory has proven true. Tier items have the same budgetary value as other items of the same ilevel, thus useful bonuses are icing on the cake. Even bad itemization of a piece or two is overwhelmed by the benefit of the 2 and 4 piece bonuses.
Gemming and Enchanting
Gemming
Str is so far superior to every other stat, that you do not even want to Hit or Expertise cap through gemming. Gem pure Str except in the following situations.
Replacing a single gem with a Str/rating hybrid for a +20 (or greater) Str bonus. No Str loss, 20+ rating gain. Free lunch.
Replacing two gems with Str/rating hybrids for +30 Str bonus. You lose 10 Str for 40 rating. Minor net gain.
Replacing a single gem with a Str/rating hybrid for a +30 Mastery Rating bonus. The loss of 20 Str for 50 Mastery (20 from gem, 30 from bonus) may be a net DPS gain. This will depend on your own stat weighting.
T11: A +20 Mastery Rating bonus is not worth a single hybrid gem. The loss of 20 Str for 40 Mastery is a net DPS loss.
Mid/late T12: A +20 Mastery Rating bonus or a +10 Str bonus becomes worth a single hybrid gem. This includes both Str/Mastery and Str/Hit (allows better reforging).
T13: Many items have 3 gems, thus +30 bonuses. A single hybrid to meet this requirement should uniformly be advantageous.
In general you will see +10 stats for a single socket bonus, +20 for two sockets, +30 for three sockets. Helmets break this rule and may be significantly higher for a single socket (and meta).
Meta-Gems
[Reverberating Shadowspirit Diamond] is now the superior Ret Meta Gem. The pattern to cut this Meta is a random world drop.
It requires 3 Red gems, so meeting the requirement is more or less a given.
A helm must have a Meta present, even if inactive, to activate socket bonus on that item.
Enchants
•Head 60 Str / 30 Mastery Wildhammer/Dragonmaw Rep Arcanum
•Cloak 65 Crit Swordguard from Tailoring may be the largest profession damage boost. 50 Crit may be used if you decide 15 extra Crit rating is not worth 5 Maelstrom Crystals.
•Shoulder 50 Str/25 Crit Therazane rep. Inscriptionist-only enchant grants 130 Str.
•Chest 20 Stats
•Bracers 50 Str Leatherworker-only enchant is 130 Str - possibly 2nd largest profession damage boost (behind Tailoring).
•Gloves 50 Str
•Belt Free Socket Free socket is free.
•Legs 190 AP / 55 Crit Only DPS increasing selection.
•Feet 50 Mastery or 50 Hit PoJ makes runspeed enchants moot. 50 Mastery and Hit are interchangeable due to reforging. One may provide 1 or 2 more total ratings by reforging closer to a cap.
•Weapon Landslide
Cooldowns
Avenging Wrath
Avenging Wrath increases all damage by 20% while in effect. Fully talented this lasts 20 seconds with a 2 minute cooldown, thus providing a 16.6% effective up-time. While the most impact is granted during Heroism as the increased autoattack rate and decreased CS CD allow more (or more superior) attacks, losing an entire Avenging Wrath during a fight because you delayed for Heroism is a net loss.
During AW, even if the target's health is above 20%, you can use HoW. Make sure to use those HoW that become available.
Details on maximizing buff from these CD with 4T12 are listed under the Set Bonuses section.
Zealotry
Zealotry permits Crusader Strike to grant 3 HP per attack for 20 seconds with a 2 minute cooldown (35 seconds with 4T12). This shortcuts the rotation to CS, TV, Filler, repeat.
Maximum benefit appears derived by using AW and Zealotry together. The HoW and any Exo procs may "lose" some CS and TV over the course of the buffs, but the overall damage is superior from the combination.
Details on maximizing buff from these CD with 4T12 are listed under the Set Bonuses section.
Guardian of Ancient Kings
Guardian of Ancient Kings provides a stacking Strength buff. The buff stacks to a maximum of 20, providing a 20% bonus to Str. The buff lasts until the Guardian dies or when it expires 30 seconds after cast.
In a CD sequence it is advised to use GoAK first to stack the Str bonus. After 10 seconds you would use AW and/or Zeal. This would provide the maximum Str benefit for the entirety of the AW/Zeal.
*** There is more to the guide originally written by Exemplar for elitist jerks: if you would like to read more into the theory crafting I recommend you follow the link provided.***
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I am stating my opinion. Obviously you don't like it. Honestly, I don't care. |
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