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Ulduar Gear Preview - Part 1, Helms
Posted April 02, 2009 at 03:22 PM by Eirchi
<insert sound of gnome wrestling with BBCode tables here>
Well, I don't seem to be able to create a proper table with this BBCode. This is the best I could manage.
Here's how I'm going to be ranking gear, starting with helms:
First note that the ratings are divided for hit capped players and non hit capped players. What's so special about Hit that we need two different rankings? Hit is the only warlock gear stat that's easily "capped". Up until the cap Hit is the most valuable stat, after you're capped it's worth zero, zip, nada, zilch. Gear rankings without separate values for hit capped and non-capped are bogus.
The central concept here is that gear is rated from A to E. Gear with the same rating should perform equivalently. For example if you're not hit capped both Cowl of the Absolute and Cowl of Icy Breaths, both rated A-, should provide about the same DPS. Collar of the Wyrmhunter, rated B+, is lower DPS, but close. The old king of hit in the helm slot was Faerlina's Madness, rated D+ now. This means there's a big difference in DPS between the top three new helms and Faerlina's Madness.
If you're already hit capped the best helm is still good old Hood of Rationality from Malygos, rated A-. However the new T8 heroic helm is very close, rated B+. It's so close in fact that if you have another piece of T8 and can active the two piece set bonus it becomes the best in slot helm. For these charts I don't assume you've got any other particular gear so you have to manually adjust a little if you get a set bonus.
Finally, you won't find any gear rated A+ or A yet, I'm reserving those values for higher level Ulduar end boss gear that hasn't been unearthed yet.
Next up: Ranking Necks
Well, I don't seem to be able to create a proper table with this BBCode. This is the best I could manage.
Here's how I'm going to be ranking gear, starting with helms:
First note that the ratings are divided for hit capped players and non hit capped players. What's so special about Hit that we need two different rankings? Hit is the only warlock gear stat that's easily "capped". Up until the cap Hit is the most valuable stat, after you're capped it's worth zero, zip, nada, zilch. Gear rankings without separate values for hit capped and non-capped are bogus.
The central concept here is that gear is rated from A to E. Gear with the same rating should perform equivalently. For example if you're not hit capped both Cowl of the Absolute and Cowl of Icy Breaths, both rated A-, should provide about the same DPS. Collar of the Wyrmhunter, rated B+, is lower DPS, but close. The old king of hit in the helm slot was Faerlina's Madness, rated D+ now. This means there's a big difference in DPS between the top three new helms and Faerlina's Madness.
If you're already hit capped the best helm is still good old Hood of Rationality from Malygos, rated A-. However the new T8 heroic helm is very close, rated B+. It's so close in fact that if you have another piece of T8 and can active the two piece set bonus it becomes the best in slot helm. For these charts I don't assume you've got any other particular gear so you have to manually adjust a little if you get a set bonus.
Finally, you won't find any gear rated A+ or A yet, I'm reserving those values for higher level Ulduar end boss gear that hasn't been unearthed yet.
Next up: Ranking Necks
Total Comments 8
Comments
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Nice work.
One thing though:
Sometimes it is important to be able to compare gear with and without hit rating.
Lets assume we are hit capped. According to your table I should avoid touching any head item with hit rating on it (assume my current head item has no hit). However a good head item with hit on it might allow me to switch out a hit item for a non-hit item in another slot, resulting in an overall dps increase. If you can't compare hit and non-hit gear, how can you find this possibility without testing all possible gear combinations.
CheersPosted April 02, 2009 at 08:35 PM by lilsteele
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You can still compare items using the grades. So in your example if you've got a C helm with no hit and an A helm with hit drops and you have two bracers rated C with both hit and no hit switching helms and bracers would be an upgrade. If you were switching from C helm to A helm but from C bracers to E bracers it would probably be a wash.Posted April 03, 2009 at 12:57 PM by Eirchi
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Ah, that sounds reasonable. Thnx.
I like the grades. I hate those best in slot discussions based on somewhat random numbers... In practice noone notices that 2 dps difference that simcraft gives you...Posted April 03, 2009 at 07:00 PM by lilsteele
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BiS discussions are not based on random numbers. They are based on an item's weight scale with stats. Most BiS discussions give you 2 options. One is BiS with hit, and one is without. They also break it down by DPS increase per item, which really is the best way to do it.Posted April 06, 2009 at 01:46 PM by Fallenman
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If you are not at hit cap, Cowl of Icy Breaths - Item - World of Warcraft is a better item than Cowl of the Absolute - Item - World of Warcraft. Having a meta slot is a key to that statement. Collar of the Wyrmhunter - Item - World of Warcraft is also better than cowl of the absolute.Posted April 06, 2009 at 01:52 PM by Fallenman
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This is one area that's a little tricky. The helms were simulated with Ember Skyflare Diamond and the rankings are correct. It is possible that using the crit meta would be a better choice for some builds.
To say Cowl of Icy Breaths is better than Cowl of the Absolute is the wrong mentality. If one is 2 dps better than the other then they are basically the same.Posted April 14, 2009 at 03:00 PM by Eirchi
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Except 2 dps does not equal 0 dps difference. That's the point of a BiS list. It means absolute best.Posted April 14, 2009 at 03:41 PM by Fallenman
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Except it's not 2 dps difference. It's a guestimated, simulated, approximated, estimated, psuedo-calculated 2 dps difference for one spec with one gear set and one raid configuration. Pretending that the numbers are accurate enough to say it's a 2 dps difference is misleading.
What's not misleading is to say these two items are both rated B+. Think of the letter grades as a mixture of the gear's item level combined with how well they're itemized for standard Warlock builds and rotations/priorities.Posted April 14, 2009 at 04:18 PM by Eirchi
