Some preliminary conclusions concerning avoidance in 3.2

Modal wrote:Yeah a macro would work too. But seriously, Rating Buster is an addon everyone who cares at all about the numbers behind their numbers should have.

Yeah, and the people reading this thread care about those numbers. The people that use a guide to tell them what and how to gear themselves don't.

It's sort of like making a paladin gear list with just a link to wowhead and a comment to "learn how to filter". It works fine for most anyone who reads the advanced forum, and doesn't work for most anyone else.

Mithos wrote:Ratings buster is pretty fucking awesome anyway. A non intrustive highly configureable addon is better than just a macro tbh.

This. Saying, "Install Rating Buster to see numbers that aren't normally visible in game" is not at all the same as telling somebody to l2theorycraft. I think a macro would be a good alternative, but then again, how many players are going to be comfortable with macros but not at all with addons? Rating Buster is not hard to use, at all, and is extremely unobtrusive.

Sure, and I'm constantly amazed at how many people ask on these boards for help finding the uncrushability macro, since every one of them should have installed Tankadin already anyway.

I think there's a larger group of macro-using addon-avoiding theorycraft-hating tankadins than you believe. Given that I believe that being able to read and follow theorycraft is a mandatory part of being a good tank, I do shudder to think what their DPS and healers might feel. But I acknowledge they exist and are the primary audience for things like the gearing guides.

(Back on topic) Thanks as usual Theck for your analysis.

Digren wrote:I think there's a larger group of macro-using addon-avoiding theorycraft-hating tankadins that you believe. Given that I believe that being able to read and follow theorycraft is a mandatory part of being a good tank, I do shudder to think what their DPS and healers might feel. But I acknowledge they exist and are the primary audience for things like the gearing guides.

I think that the majority of good (alternatively, "passionate") tanks use macros, addons, and read theorycraft to help them perform to the best of their ability. I think that anybody who reads or posts on this site pretty much by definition falls into this category.

But based on how many tankadins I know personally who have 0/2 Imp Judgement, swear by Blade Ward, gem for Parry, and do around 3000 TPS on average...yeah, they're out there.

I consider myself to be very "up" on our changes, but I don't use Tankadin or Rating Buster (which I have installed, but turned off). I'm just not a huge fan of add-ons, I'd prefer to do the math (taking the guidelines from theorycrafting. THANKS THECK and all the other guys who keep us on track!!!!).

Rating buster, while useful, I don't find necessary, usually when I get to the point that I have a question about my gear it's so non-standard that I wouldn't just trust an add-on to steer me right, I'd prefer the opinions of people w/ real-world expereince doing the same thing. That's why I love you guys for. ^^

That being said, I haven't used Tankadin and can't look it up while I'm at work, anyone care to "sell me" on it? Not sure exactly what it does. /embarrased

I couldn't live without RatingBuster. Being able to compare two pieces of gear and have at your fingertips the net difference in avoidance% without having to do dodge and parry comparison calculations in my head is excellent. The fact that it also tells me how much HP, hit, spellpower, etc. that I'm trading for that avoidance seals the deal.

Not that it's a mandatory addon or anything, I'm just an information whore. And lazy.

I want to use it, but how do you account for the value of gem slots, or enchants?

Venoseth wrote:I want to use it, but how do you account for the value of gem slots, or enchants?

You can set it to assume you'll put certain gems in each color slot, and it'll take those into account automatically.

I haven't used Rating Busters but I'm a huge fan of Tankpoints. Not sure what the general concensus is on that but it helps me at times.

theckhd wrote:

towelliee wrote:So basically according to patch notes my 8agi 12stam gems are like useless...

Not sure why you'd say that, Agi is just as viable as it was before compared to dodge, nothing's changed there. I'll still be using agi/stam gems instead of dodge/stam gems.

I posted the rule of thumb upthread:

Code: Select all

    (character_sheet_dodge_% - 10) / (character_sheet_parry_% - 10) = 1.88

Just evaluate that ratio for your own character. If it comes out over 1.88, then start stacking parry. If it's under 1.88, stack dodge. The goal is to balance the two with your gemming decisions.

So this is the gospel for 3.2? Assuming they made no changes after they pulled the PTR down?

The 3.2 gem and enchant guide needs some serious work to accommodate these shifts. I just want to make sure these early conclusions stayed valid.

Yes, as far as I'm aware nothing's changed. The advice remains:

Code: Select all

(character_sheet_dodge_% - 10) / (character_sheet_parry_% - 10) = 1.88

The people who care about that last 0.05% avoidance can read this thread to make sure they're hitting the "efficient" defense rating marks.

I don't have the tankadin addon, actually, but I could not live without Ratings buster. I also love TankPoints.

i was reading you post about 1.88 dodge/parry ratio
i have 31.45% (661 rating)dodge and 18.87% (276 rating) parry (stats from rawr, fully raid buffed)

Code: Select all

(character_sheet_dodge_% - 10) / (character_sheet_parry_% - 10) = 1.88

that would come out to 21.45 / 8,87 = 2,4 meaning parry would be superior
however, when i punch my stats into rawr, dodge comes out on top. error in rawr, the above assumption or me?

i was also wondering if there where any math supporting agi/stam gems over dodge/stam gems?

imapler wrote:i was reading you post about 1.88 dodge/parry ratio
i have 31.45% (661 rating)dodge and 18.87% (276 rating) parry (stats from rawr, fully raid buffed)

Code: Select all

(character_sheet_dodge_% - 10) / (character_sheet_parry_% - 10) = 1.88

that would come out to 21.45 / 8,87 = 2,4 meaning parry would be superior
however, when i punch my stats into rawr, dodge comes out on top. error in rawr, the above assumption or me?

i was also wondering if there where any math supporting agi/stam gems over dodge/stam gems?

I doubt rawr is correct. If you must have a double-check, the easy thing to do would be to just check your own character sheet.
Take a green dodge gem and a green parry gem, and an empty socket, and find out which one shows more avoidance on the character sheet.

imapler wrote:i have 31.45% (661 rating)dodge and 18.87% (276 rating) parry (stats from rawr, fully raid buffed)

A minor quibble but you don't actually have 661 dodge rating - raid buffs give you a fairly large amount of agi (from Horn of Winter/Mark of the Wild/Kings) which is contributing to your dodge percentage.

Also, dodge has always been superior to agility in terms of pure avoidance, however the difference is minimal (off the top of my head its about 0.02% difference) and agility offers effective health gains through armor and a minimal amount of crit for threat generation in addition to its avoidance. That's why people use it over pure dodge.