Icecrown 5-man – weapons

Being the last with the news has its advantages. You don’t have to turn to datamining yourself, you can just pull information off other places. Since 3.3 is purportedly coming on the 9th (or 8th) of this month, it might be time to look at what one can actually get in there.

Naturally enough, weapons are the first thing that come to mind. So let’s have a quick look at the weapons that we may find in the 5-man instance.

Or should I say: weapon

So far, the PTR people have uncovered one single fury weapon in the 5-man instance: the Tyrannical Beheader. While it preserves the status quo from the Coliseum 5-man, where you also found precisely 1 weapon, it does leave me asking the question: “Well, what if you’d prefer slightly different stats? Where’s the choice?” Grumbling aside, let’s look at the stats

• 129 Strength (258 AP)
• 92 Haste Rating
• 53 Armor Penetration (3.44% ArPen)
• 1 Yellow socket

Compare this to the other two lvl232 weapons, the Reckoning and the Keen Obsidian Edged Blade.

Reckoning

• 183 AP
• 112 Agility (1.72% Crit)
• 62 Haste Rating
• 86 Armor Penetration (5.59% ArPen)
• 1 Blue socket

Keen Obsidian Edged Blade

• 129 Strength (258 AP)
• 92 Expertise Rating (11.22 Exp)
• 61 Crit Rating (1.33% Crit)

Looking at the stats distribution, the Beheader falls somewhere inbetween the Reckoning and the OEB. It has the “undesirable” Haste from the Reckoning but has a Socket, as opposed to the OEB from which it gets its Strength. All in all, its an okayish weapon, but I wouldnt swap my Reckoning for it, if I had one that is. If you currently equip an OEB, it might be worth it, but only if you can get those 11 Exp from elsewhere. And even then it is weigning Crit Rating vs ArPen, Haste, and a Socket. It’ll come down to individual gearing.

Overall, the Beheader is solid but not great. It is sure to be an upgrade for the people who’ve not yet had any luck with weapons upgrades in TotCR (like me), but it will not be much of an upgrade otherwise. Of course, if you are running 25-man raids, or heroic 10-man raids, this isn’t an upgrade at all.

Upcoming, a look at the armour drops from the 5-man Icecrown.

The neverending story – addons

A while back I did some talking (well, writing) about addons for furies. Quite a bit of time has passed since then, and as is the case with UI’s…they change. And consequently, mine has changed too. This has involved some addons being chucked out, others come in, and yet others staying the same.

The list I posted originally was the following:

• SatrinaBuffFrames
• Bartender4
• Grid
• DBM (DeadlyBossMods)
• Recount
• Omen
• AzCastBars
• OmniCC

I’ll spoil the ending, I have actually changed things:

• SatrinaBuffFrames
• Bartender4
• Grid
• DBM (DeadlyBossMods)
• Recount
• Omen
• Quartz
• OmniCC

Hard to spot the difference? I swapped AzCastBars for Quartz, simply because I felt like trying it. And it worked out, as well as do some other nice things, so I decided to keep it.

Anyway, the above addons aren’t the whole picture, they’re the combat/fury related addons. Other addons that have snuck their way into my addons folder:

• Chatter
• TotemTimers (for when the shammy calls)
• Clique (oh gosh does it make healing nice)

Still, as addon collections go, I consider myself relatively lightweight. But, if I essentially haven’t changed my addons lineup, why resurrect the dead horse? Because I felt like it, and particularly because the addons themselves are only half the story. The big, gigantic, huge, issue is how we apply them to our UI’s, whether we do it according to the “more is better” principle or whatever other idea that made sense at the time.

Let’s apply the question to my own UI then. What has changed? It might be worth it to look at my various ideas of what makes a UI, the central theme so to speak.

The analogue approach

When designing an interface there are two schools of thought essentially. The one I call the analogue approach, and the digital approach. I first thought of it in relation to synthesizers and other electronic gadgets (it applies to anything electronic essentially). In more visual terms, on one hand you have the apparatus with every parameter having its own knob or dial, so that all the information is visible all the time. On the other hand you have a menu driven interface, which shows you only the barest necessities at all times, while hiding more detailed information in a slick (or not so slick) menu system. But you get a very simple interface out of it.

When I first started playing WoW, I was firmly rooted in the analogue mindset. I wanted all the abilities visible, in an orderly way of course, all the time. In raids, I could see everybodies mana and health, I could see tanks targets, all that jazz. The advantage was that I did not have to open any windows or browse any menus to see something…it was all there (within reason).

The clean analogue

Eventually, as I think happens for every analogue person, you are able to sort through the information available to you, and you decide what is unimportant, and cut it out. Its akin to packing for a camping trip…you lay all of the gear out you want to bring, upon packing you find it’ll weigh too much, and you cut out the stuff you dont need.

This was also the time when I really started taking an interest in how the UI looked, the time of SimpleMap, Buttonfacade, those kinds of things.

Do I really need that?

Granted, I am not one of those people who can cut the UI entirely. Two reasons. The first…I AM A CLICKER! There, I said it, now stop laughing. The second…a visible UI is just part of WoW for me. If it wasn’t there, something would be missing. As a result, I haven’t gone all minimalist, but I have started using addon functionality. For example I have a bar that only shows in combat, full of things that I’d never need outside combat (pots, stones, disarm macro, demo shout, that sort of thing).

That said, as I’ve said before, I am quite minimalist on which addons I install. If I don’t strictly need it, it goes. So apart from one eyecandy addon (Chatter), I have no purely visual addons installed any more. Part of the reason for this was that I, maybe as a minority, do like some of the UI graphics, like the default player and target frames, and the map itself. So I have tried to preserve as much of it as possible, not that its much mind you.

Wot now?

Put shortly: How should I know? I have been using the same addons for 6 months (for the newest one), so my UI is quite stable in that regard. Sometimes it does happen that addons get discontinued, but if you choose the old and popular addons, chances are that they wont. It isn’t so much a case of finding new addons as it is a case of streamlining how the UI works, what the addons do…it is shaping the flow of information itself, rather than changing the pipes.

For a more tangible prediction about the future: I’ll be taking a look at my addons again, as well as my UI as a whole.

You are at the end of the road. Do you…

Patch 3.3 is coming, yay woohoo, all that jazz. By now we’ve all no doubt been following it meticulously. Or possibly not. In effect I am asking myself this question: is patch 3.3 just more of the same old grind that we got in 3.2? Or is it the spine tingling conclusion to 5 years of arch nemesis lore. Yes, I remember back in vanilla when Icecrown was only talked about in whispers, where Northrend was this forbidden continent to the far north, frozen and ancient, filled with horrors of the lich kings creation.

Now Kel’Thuzad, once the scourge of Lordaeron, is no more. Even the old god of death, Yogg-Saron is no more. And the valiant heroes of Azeroth have taken to slaughtering eachother in the arena, supposedly as way of selecting only the worthy people to go to Icecrown Citadel. Tirion does have a bit of explanation to do there in my opinion.

In short: Is Icecrown more of the grindy loot fest that the Argent Coliseum has been? Or is it actually going to be a climactic struggle, rivalling Ragnaros in epicness? Yes, ol’ Rag is a shade of his former self these days, but answer me truthfully those of you who witnessed it back then: Was it not epic when he burst forth from his pool of molten rock? TOO SOON EXECUTUS!

To answer the question, it may well be a climactic struggle, an epic ending to an epic expansion. But story and lore is but one part of the epic feeling. The other is…loot. And the third is: stuff to do that isn’t just dailies and more silly rep grinding.

I might’ve covered point 1 already. Let’s get right down to point 2 then, the loot, the reason we kill the poor bosses 10 times rather than 1. And with that, we have to mention the loot distribution system since its an integral part of the whole notion of loot. It is possibly here that we’ll see the crux of the matter appear.

Now, Blizz have already revealed the loot system, or rather it has been mentioned in various places by people who have experienced it on the PTR. The usual clause about subject to change will apply here of course. But judging from this description(link) we will have to first get the standard “hohum” version of the epic, only to upgrade it as we go along. Sound like a familiar system? That’s because it is…it’s a slightly altered version of the Zul’Gurub and Ahn’Qiraj loot systems. While those were perhaps based on rep it still amounts to the same thing; you have to grind the instance enough to get the loot.

In effect that places a brake on things, not the progress per se, but the loot progression itself. It would only hinder raid progression if it contained blocking mechanisms like FR or FrR or some other vanilla tactic, but it doesn’t. So why do it at all? Because it will extend the length of time that people will be interested in going back to the instance. Not that there will be anywhere better to go, but it seems simply like a delaying tactic. People are going to get their T10 no doubt, they just have to wait a tiny bit longer before they upgrade it.

The third leg is the “non raiding” bit of the patch. Realistically speaking, I doubt very much that we’ll get a departure from the Coliseum formula. The indications all point to more of the same, for better or worse. There is a new faction to grind for too (The Ashen Verdict). It is a tried and tested formula, but one can’t help but think that it starts feeling a bit samey by now. “Right-o, that’s one more faction to exalted. Next!”

It is the balancing act between the (perhaps) too hard reputation requirements for the heroics of TBC and the fact that immediate access, or “default key”, solutions are…let’s face it…boring. If anybody can just waltz in, a bit of the feeling of achievement does go away. For some that is no problem (yes, I’m looking at you “gief eipx n0w!” people), but for people whom might be a tiny bit interested in stories and lore it is unsatisfying. I could go on at length, but that would be a topic all of its own. The important point is to appreciate the tightrope that Blizz is walking.

So, all that said, will Icecrown Citadel be a fitting conclusion to the reign of the Lich King? From a game perspective seen, Blizzard are pouring all of their experience into making it the best raiding instance yet, and given their ability to walk tightropes, it is quite certain to be a good bit of fun. While Naxx might have suffered because it was essentially a pre-TBC refurbished to modern standards, Ulduar (and to a lesser extent the Coliseum) had very new and very interesting challenges. And most of all, it had a grand majesty about it…and is there anything better than to kill bosses in environments that look nice? I am confident that the raiding aspect will be good and that we wont be let down.

And just to reiterate it, yes I fully expect a new batch of dailies and new pets, and new tabards, and new bits and bobs to grind for. After all, we have to make money for repairs don’t we. While I don’t enjoy the grindy aspect of WoW, I am quite certain that we wont be let down here either.

That said however, in one way patch 3.3 is destined to fail.

Bringing closure to a storyline that began with the very launch of vanilla WoW 5 years of go cannot possibly live up to all the stories, memories and lore that comes before it. I still remember entering the Western Plaguelands, riding to Chillwind on my slow horse and taking in the destruction and desolation that the Scourge had brought with them. The names and the places of the past, when they were more than just places to grind runecloth for a tailoring alt: Andorhal, Corrins Crossing, Scholomance, Stratholme…

So when the Lich King finally dies, when Arthas and Nerzhul are finally destroyed…then what? Do we go back to the daily grind for the Ashen Verdict “to get that cool undead baby gryphon” or do we sit back and reflect upon the 5 years that have built up to this moment?

What will you do?

Looking for Dungeon?

So, Blizz are doing away with the heroic dailies, and good riddance. The concept is rather dated now, and I think something new is going to make a nice change. After having ground dailies for near on a year, I would imagine most people tend to see it that way.

Roll on patch 3.3 and its new hot item: Looking for Dungeon, and its partner, “random players”. It’s essentially a way to bring people to PUG. There is even an achievement (3 in fact) for grouping with many random people. So, all is well and good, isn’t it? Well yes, if you’re the type of person who jumps onto WoW and jumps into LFG to get the daily done prontolike. What, you mean some people aren’t?!

Now, this may be a “whine for the sake of whine” post, but even so I think it deserves to be said: The LFD is inadvertently punishing players who like to group up with people they know (guildies, friends, you name it) by rewarding people who sit in LFG more. Essentially, that is what is potentially going to happen: guilds not grouping up anymore since the rewards are greater for doing it with complete strangers.

At this stage it should be noted that the emblem rewards do not look to be affected (maybe?) by this; it is solely the monetary reward you get from the first instance run of the day. Big deal eh? Sure, if you don’t instance for the money that’s all hunkydory. On the other hand, why should people be reverse punished for preferring their guildies and friends?

I see this as Blizzards attempt to combat the waves of soloing instances that is going on these days. Or soloing quests. Or soloing anything. People solo whenever they can get away with it, simply because it’s more convenient at most times. However, MMO’s are all about grouping, so why not incentivise that…which is precisely what Blizzard have done.

Only, they’ve kicked the groups of friends or guilds a bit in the shins with this one. And before anybody says it: yes I’m shallow that way, that I would like to reap the maximum monetary benefit from the daily instance. So sue me. Blizz have always told us to play with our friends (but kindly reminded us that we should go outside Azeroth with them as well), except now they’re paying us not to.

Note: At the time of writing, there are a lot of unknowns in this equation. And I haven’t gone into detail about the finer workings of the LFD system, mostly beause it’s still being tested and is subject to change.

So, Blizz are doing away with the heroic dailies, and good riddance. The concept is rather dated now, and I think something new is going to make a nice change. After having ground dailies for near on a year, I would imagine most people tend to see it that way.

Roll on patch 3.3 and its new hot item: Looking for Dungeon, and its partner, “random players”. It’s essentially a way to bring people to PUG. There is even an achievement (3 in fact) for grouping with many random people. So, all is well and good, isn’t it? Well yes, if you’re the type of person who jumps onto WoW and jumps into LFG to get the daily done prontolike. What, you mean some people aren’t?!

Now, this may be a “whine for the sake of whine” post, but even so I think it deserves to be said: The LFD is inadvertently punishing players who like to group up with people they know (guildies, friends, you name it) by rewarding people who sit in LFG more. Essentially, that is what is potentially going to happen: guilds not grouping up anymore since the rewards are greater for doing it with complete strangers.

At this stage it should be noted that the emblem rewards do not look to be affected (maybe?) by this; it is solely the monetary reward you get from the first instance run of the day. Big deal eh? Sure, if you don’t instance for the money that’s all hunky dory. On the other hand, why should people be reverse punished for preferring their guildies and friends to completely random strangers, who might or might not be any good at what they do.

I see this as Blizzards attempt to combat the waves of soloing instances that is going on these days. Or soloing quests. Or soloing anything. People solo whenever they can get away with it, simply because it’s more convenient at most times. However, MMO’s are all about grouping, so why not incentivise that…which is precisely what Blizzard have done.

Only, they’ve kicked the groups of friends or guilds a bit in the shins with this one. And before anybody says it: yes I’m shallow that way, that I would like to reap the maximum monetary benefit from the daily instance. So sue me. Blizz have always told us to play with our friends (but kindly reminded us that we should go outside Azeroth with them as well), except now they’re paying us not to. Is there some backwards logic I am missing?

Note: At the time of writing, there are a lot of unknowns in this equation. And I haven’t gone into detail about the finer workings of the LFD system, mostly beause it’s still being tested and is subject to change.

Theorycrafting – Warrior spreadsheet vs Maxdps

Who doesn’t like theorycrafting? Well, honestly, there are quite a few people who don’t enjoy spending hours crunching numbers and formulae. For the majority of the population, these pursuits take a backseat to actually playing the game. Even so, when in an instance or raid, most people like to know what a particular drop will do to their DPS. This is where the DPS calculator comes in, so that us mere mortals can take advantage of the numbercrunching efforts of others.

Enter our contestants of today. In the red corner, Landsouls spreadsheet from the Elitist Jerks forums. In the blue corner, MaxDPS.com.

Landsoul bases his sheet on the discussions and findings of the EJ hive mind; in other words a solid empirical database of knowledge, coupled with a lot of maths and numbercrunching. The result is quite possibly the best model of fury DPS outside Blizzard HQ. The downside is that the sheet isn’t exactly quick or easy to use for a first timer, especially not during a raid.

MaxDPS is the brainchild of Nuuga who has worked on it since 2006. It’s ever evolving and is continuously updated whenever classes are changed or new gear released. When you put in your stats it’ll give you a ranked list of gear based on your choice of instances. In other words, a very quick and easy way to check gear, even during raids. The downside…well, how well does it really model DPS? Is it accurate?

Which naturally enough leads to a comparison test between the two. Now, some people will say “but you’re only comparing two arbitrary computations!”, and yes I am. However, for now I will work on the assumption that Landsouls spreadsheet offers the most accurate modelling of fury DPS and mechanics, even if the numbers are off. For any simulation, there are assumptions and tradeoffs and we will in fact look at those at a later date.

For now, we’ll stick to comparisons between simulations. As a base for the following, I’ve put in the numbers and stats for my own current gear, including the most common buffs we have in my guild. We are currently working our way through Ulduar 10, so the gear is a mixed bunch of Naxx 10, Naxx 25, and Ulduar 10.

Landsouls sheet returns the following:

• Overall DPS: 2752
• White damage: 758
• Heroic Strike: 302
• Bloodthirst: 646
• Whirlwind: 473
• Bloodsurge: 231
• Deep Wounds: 340

So far so good. Let’s see what MaxDPS gives us:

• Overall DPS: 2619 (-133)
  
• White damage: 535 (-223)
• Heroic Strike: 443 (141)
• Bloodthirst: 551 (-95)
• Whirlwind: 459 (-14)
• Bloodsurge: 435 (204)
• Deep Wounds: 195 (-145)

The numbers in parentheses are the differences between the two. It’s pretty clear that the two do not really agree on anything. MaxDPS has significantly higher values for both Heroic Strike and Bloodsurge, but also very much lower values for the white damage and Deep Wounds.

There are several factors that can explain the discrepancies between the results. MaxDPS only takes raw stats for example, so weapon and item procs aren’t likely to be taken into account. Things like the Berserking proc, or the Loatheb’s Shadow on-use, or the Mirror of Truth proc (I could go on and on), will not be modelled by MaxDPS.

This is unfortunately not all. For one thing, we don’t know the exact rotation used by MaxDPS which is really the big unknown. The rotation description is woefully lacking on MaxDPS (it still says “Bloodsurge on BT proc” for example), so there is no joy there. What we’re left with is a largely unknown model which outputs numbers significantly different than a model widely accepted to be as accurate as we can get.

Let’s take an example from real life. I still offhand with the Claymore of Ancient Power. Now, suppose that I replaced that with a second Ironsoul…

According to Landsouls spreadsheet, the breakdown would look like this:

• Overall DPS: 2834
• White damage: 780
  
• Heroic Strike: 325
• Bloodthirst: 665
• Whirlwind: 492
• Bloodsurge: 239
• Deep Wounds: 332

To put the new data into MaxDPS we need to take the raw stats for the new gear configuration and put them into it. Essentially, we trade Crit Rating for Armor Penetration and Attack Power. And hey presto, MaxDPS spits out the following for us:

• Overall DPS: 2751
• White damage:539
• Heroic Strike: 494
• Bloodthirst: 569
• Whirlwind: 481
• Bloodsurge: 473
• Deep Wounds: 194

We’re not as interested in the raw numbers as we are in the differences between before and after, so let’s take a look at the differences between the Claymore offhand and the Ironsoul offhand. I’ve denoted gains with a “+” and losses with a “-“. Landsouls spreadsheet is listed to the left of the slash, MaxDPS to the right.

• Overall DPS: +82 / +132
• White Damage: +22 / +4
• Heroic Strike: +23 / +51
• Bloodthirst: +19 / +18
• Whirlwind: +19 / +22
• Bloodsurge: +8 / +38
• Deep Wounds: -8 / -1

As we would expect, our Deep Wounds damage goes down due to the loss of Crit Rating. And then it starts getting interesting. We see huge boosts in Bloodsurge and Heroic Strike for MaxDPS, but not a very big increase in white damage. Since Bloodsurge is an instant Slam, any increase in damage from it will either come from a)more frequent use or b)an increase in Attack Power. An increase in Attack Power would show a limited DPS gain, and it would also show up on Bloodthirst damage, so we’d expect to see a slight boost to Bloodsurge and a larger boost to Bloodthirst.

One example maketh not the theoretical DPS however. For the second example, let’s take the default set from the spreadsheet (as of 29.07.2009). It’s not entirely the BiS posted in the EJ forums, but it’ss close enough for jazz. To remove any “noise” from the calculations, we’ll furthermore remove everything but Battle Shout (vanilla version) and Rampage. We then get the spreadsheets results:

• Overall DPS: 3556
• White damage: 872
• Heroic Strike: 493
• Bloodthirst: 866
• Whirlwind: 588
• Bloodsurge: 282
• Deep Wounds: 452

MaxDPS gives us:

• Overall DPS: 3523 (-23)
  
• White damage: 521 (-351)
• Heroic Strike: 745 (252)
• Bloodthirst: 714 (-152)
• Whirlwind: 582 (-6)
• Bloodsurge: 700 (418)
• Deep Wounds: 260 (-192)

Again the parentheses show the difference between the two results. While MaxDPS nearly agrees with the sheet on overall DPS, the ability breakdown is quite different. The one exception is Whirlwind, where MaxDPS nearly agrees with the sheet. Of special note is the white damage contribution, which has gone down (!)

So, MaxDPS doesn’t in general agree with Landsoul’s spreadsheet. It still provides a gear list based on slots, with quick overviews of stats and drop place. Is it as updated as the sheet though with regards to gear? And the answer is: pretty much, but not quite. It doesn’t get updated quite as frequently as the spreadsheet, and so it might take a while for very new items to show up.

After all of the above, it’s fair to ask: “Aren’t we comparing apples and oranges here?” And the answer depends wholly on your viewpoint. These are two very different animals. On one hand we have a spreadsheet made to be as accurate as possible, and to include as many of the mechanics as possible, and on the other hand we have a simple-to-use gear interface for showing gear in a ranked fashion. On one hand we have a tool for the numbercrunchers and on the other we have a tool for the person who needs to see whether Gear Piece X is an upgrade, before the Need/Greed timer runs out thankyouverymuch.

If you’re looking to tweak your gear, spec or to see what a bit of kit will do to your DPS, then Landsouls spreadsheet is the better of the two. Likewise, if you’re in a raid/instance and a piece of gear drops that might just be an upgrade, although possibly not, then Landsoul is again the better. MaxDPS most likely cuts some corners with the calculations and ends up some numbers that are…well, let’s call them puzzling. On the other hand, if you look at MaxDPS as a quick and dirty guide to gear, for the raider or dungeoneer who has been caught unawares or unprepared, then it does come into its own. It’s as simple as clicking an icon and looking at the list. The ranking system may be off, but the list is still there.

Verdict: Landsouls spreadsheet snatches this one with its more accurate and believable model of warrior DPS.