Combat Stats
Hit Cap: 9% +Hit → 296 Hit Rating (Level 80) →197 Hit Rating with Focused Aim (Level 80)
@Graymatter Mana Regen: Spirit vs Crit SpellPower vs Haste Rating Moonkin Rotation Statas Vs Crit Haste Spirit Mana Regen Haste Set Bonus
@tanklikeagirl
Combat Ratings
Updated for WotLK!
This is an overview of the combat ratings and how they translate into the various skills. Thanks to Whitetooth, author of RatingBuster, who provided these numbers.
Combat Ratings conversions at level 80 (rounded to 1 decimal point):
Defense Rating: 4.9 rating grants 1 defense skill.
Dodge Rating: 39.3 rating grants 1% dodge
Parry Rating: 49.1 rating grants 1% parry
Block Rating: 16.4 rating grants 1% block chance
Hit Rating: 32.8 rating grants 1% hit chance
Spell Hit Rating: 26.2 rating grants 1% spell hit chance
Critical Strike Rating: 45.9 rating grants 1% critical strike chance
Haste Rating: 32.8 rating grants 1% haste
Resilience Rating: 82 rating grants 1% less chance of being struck by any type of critical strike, and 2% less damage taken from critical strikes
Expertise: 32.8 rating grants 1% less dodge/parry of mobs
Armor Penetration: 15.4 rating grants 1% armor penetration
Caps of note for protection warriors:
Defense Cap: 540 Defense Skill
Hit Cap: 295.1 Hit Rating
Expertise Dodge Reduction Cap: 213.1 Expertise Rating
Expertise Parry Reduction Cap: ~409.9 Expertise Rating
@wowwiki
There are many aspects to the problem how to optimize a healers endurance. Let us look at the various item stats which can affect healer mana and/or efficiency.
Intellect
Int simply increases the mana pool and spell crit chance. It is the benchmark for the other stats.
Update: Intellect now increases the amount of mana regenerated per point of spirit by a sqrt relationship.
Spirit
When considering spi, it is important to understand how mana regeneration works (see 5 second rule). Mods exist which collect the data on how much time is spent inside the 5 second rule, and how much mana each point of spirit regenerated (like Spirit versus Intellect). For “average” combats it’s safe to assume that 1 spi = 1 int.
Mana/5
At first glance, mana/5 is quite similar to spi — it regenerates mana. In combat though, mana/5 is usually “better”, as a rule of thumb a factor of 3 can be assumed (1 mana/5 = 3 spi)
+Heal
Comparing +heal to the other stats is a little tricky. It is necessary to consider current mana efficiency (HP/mana and HP/time) and its change due to +heal. For any given combat thus the saved amount of mana can be found. The effect of additional +heal becomes less after a certain point, because increasing an already high efficiency yields less of an effect than increasing a low efficiency. The various sources agree that a factor of about 8 is appropriate to convert +heal to mana/5 (1 mana/5 = +8 heal).
Spell crit%
Similar to +heal, this increases efficiency (with the added problem that crits may easily result in overheal). One percent crit in theory increases total HP healed by 0.5%, which in turn could be translated to an increase of the available mana by the same amount.
Summary
Reducing all stats to Int leads to the following:
1 Spi = 1 Int
1 Mana/5 = 3 Int
+8 heal = 3 Int
In longer fights, +heal and mana/5 become more important when grinding spi and int are preferrable. For PvP, Int is probably the most important stat because PvP encounters tend to be short but intense, and the increased critrate is important there too.
@nerfthisdruid!
Haste vs. Crit: A guide for resto druids
Inspired by Alwar’s chat message, I decided to look up some information about Crit and Haste. Both of these stats are B stats, and no self-respecting resto drood should stack for either of these at the expense of a greater stat, like spellpower or intellect. This is simply because resto druids use HoTs more than any other class, which have no cast time for haste to work on, and can’t crit. That’s looking at it simply however, and if you look deeper, there certainly are benefits to both. So if you’re looking at two pieces of gear with very similar main stats, but one has crit and the other has haste – which one should you choose? Let’s look at the pros and cons of both.
Haste
Haste works in three different ways. It reduces your global cooldown, it reduces your cast times, and it reduces the amount of time of time spent on spells that are channeled.
1. Reducing your global cooldown.
First off, what *is* a global cooldown (GCD from now on)? When you use an ability, whether it be a casted spell, a energy using stab, an instant heal, whatever – it triggers your GCD. It’s the little “clock” animation on all of your spells that’s set off every time you cast something. It’s also the rea
son that you can’t spam heals as fast as you can hit buttons or click a mouse (Apologies for the crappy arrows drawn in paint. I know, you can barely see them. The picture is just plain awful. I should change it, but if I work in Paint one more time I’m gonna cut a biotch).
GCDs are typically 1.5 seconds long. You can reduce this GCD down to 1 second with haste and talents, but you can’t get the GCD lower than that. One main exception is Nature’s Swiftness. NS doesn’t trigger any kind of GCD, which is why you can hit it and then *immediately* afterwards hit your healing touch.
With the talent Gift of the Earthmother, a druid’s GCDs of instant cast heals are reduced to 1.2 seconds. Any other haste that you have will contribute to reducing this GCD even more. However, as you get closer and closer to a 1 second cooldown, you’ll need more and more haste to give you the same reduction. I don’t know exact numbers, but I do know that to begin with, you need 32.79 haste rating to give you a 1% reduction (so, .015 seconds) of the GCD. But as you gather haste and reduce that GCD, the last .015 seconds to get it down to 1.0 seconds might require like, 100 haste (up from 32.79). I mean, don’t quote me on that. I know that there are diminishing returns; I just don’t know the extent of it. I *do* know that you would need quite a bit of haste to get that GCD down to 1 second – a rating of 500 or more, I believe.
Summary: reducing your GCD with haste is pretty rad because it means you can put more HoTs on people in a shorter amount of time.
2. Reducing your cast times.
Now certainly, druids are super HoTastic, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have *some* cast times: Regrowth, Nourish, Healing Touch. HT shouldn’t be an often used spell, but Regrowth and Nourish can get some pretty good use.
Your %of spell haste = your haste rating/32.79.
Let’s say I have 200 haste rating. 200/32.79 = 6.1% spell haste. Meaning that if I have a cast time like Regrowth, which is 2 seconds long – with 200 haste, that cast time would be reduced by 6.1%. Which in this case, 6.1% of 2 seconds is .122 seconds. (2 – .122) = a new cast time of 1.878. With a decent amount of haste, you could get Nourish close to 1 second and make it a really zippy heal.
Summary: Reducing your cast times with haste is pretty rad because it means you can put more heals on people in a shorter amount of time.
3. Reducing the amount of time spent channeling spells.
I’m not going to spend a lot of time on this one here, because really we have only one channeled spell – Tranquility. Yes, if you have haste, it will reduce the time it takes to channel (but it won’t reduce the actually healing done – you’ll still put out the same amount of healing; it will just be done in a shorter period of time). So sure, haste is good to have for tranquility as well =)
Crit
Critical strike chance (typically seen in the form of a percentage) is the chance that you will put a heal on someone that will hit them for roughly twice the amount it would normally. If you have 10% crit, then technically, 1 out of every 10 direct heals you put on a target should crit. Healing Touch, the initial portion of Regrowth, Nourish, the bloom on LB, and a swiftmend all can crit. HoTs however, cannot crit.
Because HoTs can’t crit, many people initially think that crit isn’t great for resto druids. However, I beg to differ – especially with the changes coming in 3.1.
Reasons crit is awesome:
1. Living Seed: This talent doesn’t necessarily account for a significant chunk of our healing, but it definitely is dependant on crit, and is a nice buffer especially for tanks who are taking constant damage.
Side note: I was looking through some other classes’ talents, and it struck me that druids only have one talent based on the formula “If you crit, x will proc”. Fire mages have three of those: Ignite, Master of the Elements, and Hot Streak. Holy Paladins have two, Infusion of Light and Illumination. It makes sense that we’d only have one talent based on crit (I think it would make sense even if we had none), simply because most of our heals aren’t direct crittable heals. Interesting.
2. Regrowth: If you take the talents in Improved Regrowth for the extra crit, this spell can be fairly formidable. It’s too heavy handed to use for trash healing and most raid healing, but to bring a tank back from near death with a 9k Regrowth crit PLUS the tick afterwards – now that’s a good feeling. Yes, the Improved Regrowth talent is being nerfed in 3.1, but it doesnt change the fact that Regrowth is a still a strong heal that’s got a decent chance to crit.
3. Nourish: This spell just keeps getting more and more viable, especially come 3.1. Blizz is buffing its crit chance by 25% by throwing it in the Improved Regrowth talent, and the fact that it scales with HoTs is, well, pretty hot.
4. The BLOOOOM. Guys, after 3.1, this thing could crit for 18k. Hell, with better gear from Ulduar? We’re talking over 20k here.
Disgusting.
As in, disgustingly AWESOME.
I mean, I know that most/all of that will be overheal, and I know we’ll all be out of mana by the time it blooms anyway (lol), but- but – 20k!! Just the number itself makes me giddy.
So where does this leave us?
Both haste AND crit are important to have. Crit will do nothing for your HoTs, but haste will shorten their GCD. Haste does nothing to help you land those crazy big heals, but after 3.1, a lot of crit will make your 3 stack of LB bloom for 670k. Not really. But close to it. Kinda.
Haste allows you to cast more spells in the same amount of time it would take you to cast less spells. Crit allows you to sometimes cast twice-as-big heals. So I would say, get a bit of both. Personally, I like haste – I’m an impatient little bugger and hate waiting for cast times and GCDs. I also like knowing that yes, my Regrowth *will* be .2 seconds faster every time I cast it. Every single time. What I *don’t* like is wondering if a spell is going to crit or not. But when it really comes down to it, I never select a gear upgrade based on the fact that it has haste. If it’s an upgrade in stats, then I’ll consider it, and if it happens to give me crit, or haste, or whatever, I figure, hey, it’ll balance out in the end.
TL;DR: Haste is better than crit for resto druids, but not by much. Crit is going to get better after 3.1 with Nourish and teh bloomz getting buffed. However, I still think that haste will take the cake.
Have any of you geared specifically one way or the other? I’m curious to hear what you all think of crit and haste.
ALSO: Check out Syll’s post from Rolling Hots about crit here. It’s a great resource for all your crit-related questions =D
Mana Regen: Spirit vs Crit
You probably know by know that Blizzard has made some strange choices when itemizing our T8 gear sets. Namely, they more than doubled the amount of spirit on gear from T7 to T8. I bet many of you had the same reaction that I did after seeing this. My first thought was: “What the heck is Blizzard thinking?”
After thinking about it for a little while I can come to only one conclusion. In 3.1. Blizzard is making a lot of changes to the Mana regen system. On top of that all caster DPS are losing 5% crit chance with the Nerf to Improved Scorch and Winter’s Chill, and blizzard probably assumes that we will be dropping our 4T7 set bonus and losing another5% crit chance. All in all that is a lot of mana regen going out the door. Therefore, Blizzard must be thinking that we need more Mana Regen, and Spirit = Mana Regen.
Some of you may scoff at this idea since Mana is clearly not an issue right now but that doesn’t mean it won’t be an issue in 3.1. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if we do need more regen with the arrival of the next patch, but that doesn’t mean it should come from Spirit. In this post I hope to demonstrate why most of that new Spirit should be changed to Crit Rating.
The Spirit Math:
First lets look at how Spirit base mana regen is going to be calculated in 3.1. For this exercise I’m going to assume we all have 3 points in Intensity.
The base formula for In Combat Spirit Based mana regen for moonkin is:
MP5 = (3 * (0.001 + sqrt(Int) * Spirit * Base_Regen)) * 0.5
The Base_Regen coefficient for a level 80 toon is 0.005575, and I’m going to use my stats to calculate the values for Int and Spirit. For Int, I have 925 Int unbuffed and in caster form. With full raid buffs that increases to 1243 ((925 + 60 + 51) * 1.2 = 1243.2). For Spirit I have 411 unbuffed in caster form. With raid buffs that increases to 596 ((411 + 80 + 51) * 1.1 = 596.2).
So my In Combat Spirit Based mana regen can be calculated this way:
IC SB MP5 = (3 * (0.001 + sqrt(1243) * 596 * 0.005575)) * 0.5
IC SB MP5 = (3 * (117.1468)) * 0.5 = 175.7202 Mp5
So, What happens if I increase my spirit by 1.
IC SB MP5 = (3 * (0.001 + sqrt(1243) * 597 * 0.005575)) * 0.5
IC SB MP5 = (3 * (117.3433)) * 0.5 = 176.0150 Mp5So, by increasing my Spirit by 1, I increase my In Combat Mp5 by 0.2948 (176.0150 – 175.7202 = 0.2943).The Crit Rating Math:
Now that we know what we are getting from Spirit, how much mana is generated by each point of Crit Rating?
Again, I’m going to use myself as an example. On my armory you can see that I have 17091 mana completely unbuffed. When I add Arcane Brilliance, Mark of the Wild, Blessing of Kings and Furor, my Intellect increases by 318 which translates to 4770 mana. Therefore, fully raid buffed my mana pool is 21861.
As you know every time one of our spells critically hits we regenerate 2% of our total mana. So, every time one of my spells crits I regenerate 437 mana ( 21861 * 0.02 = 437.22). Now, each additional point of Crit rating gives you an additional 0.02179% chance to crit ( 1 / 4590 = 0.0002179).Therefore, on average an additional point of Crit Rating will regenerate 0.09522 mana per crit-able spell cast (437 * 0.0002179 = 0.09522).
Now we need to translate this into Mp5 and to do that we need to calculate the average cast time of Starfire and Wrath.
A couple of Assumptions:
1. In raid, I have about 46% chance to crit. In 3.1 one that will shrink by 5% due to the Imp Scorch Nerf, and I will lose another 5% by dropping the 4T7 set bonus. So, I will assume that my crit chance is 36% for Wrath and 39% for starfire in this calculation.
2. I have 16.19% haste from gear. I assume that I will also have 3% from Celestial Focus, 3% from Imp Moonkin Form, and 5% from Wrath of Air. This a total haste value of 29.43% before Nature’s Grace.
3. I’m going to ignore the increase crit chance from Eclipse for now.
4. I’m assuming that Starfire will represent 75% of our Damage and Wrath the other 25%.
Now, lets look at the uptime of Natures Grace:
SF NG Up Time = 1 – (1 – 0.39)2 = 62.79%
Wrath NG Up Time = 1 – (1 – 0.36)3 = 73.79%Therefore the average Starfire cast time can be calculated as:
Avg SF Cast Time = (3/(1+0.2943)) * (1-0.6279) + (3/((1+0.2943)*1.2)) * (0.6279)
Avg SF Cast Time = (2.3179) * (0.3721) + (1.9315) * (0.6279) = 2.0753 secondsThe average Wrath Cast time looks like this, but remember that it can’t go below 1 second due to the global cooldown:
Avg W Cast Time = (1.5/(1+0.2943)) * (1-0.7379) + (1.5/((1+0.2943)*1.2)) * (0.7379)
Avg W Cast Time = (1.1589) * 1-0.7379) + (1#) * (0.7379) = 1.0416 seconds– Actual value is less then 1, but the GCD sets a floor of a 1 second cast.
So, how much Mp5 is regenerated by each of these spells:
Mp5 from SF = (5 / 2.0753) * 0.09522 = 0.2294 Mp5
Mp5 from W = (5 / 1.0416) * 0.09522 = 0.4571 Mp5
So, by these calculations each point of Crit Rating is worth:
Mp5 per Crit Rating = (0.2294 * 0.75) + (0.4571 * 0.25) = 0.2863 Mp5
Please Note: I do not claim that this number is perfect. In actuality this number should be a little lower. Obviously not every spell we cast has a chance to crit and we are not casting 100% of the time, but I do believe that it is in the right ball park. Please remember that I have also excluded Eclipse from the analysis would would greatly increase the amount of Mp5 generated by Mana on Crit.
Conclusions:
Lets compare the two numbers I calculated. One point of Spirit will increase my In Combat mana regen by 0.2948 Mp5. One point of Crit Rating will increase my In Combat mana regen by 0.2863 Mp5. So, Spirit returns only 2.97% more mana then Crit Rating does by these calculations. Granted the Crit Rating number might be over estimated by a little bit, but the Spirit number may also be over estimated if you ever drop out of the 5 second rule.If we look at it from a DPS stand point we know that Crit Rating is vastly superior. For my gear level, I’ve calculated Crit Rating to be worth 0.80 Spell power per point. Each point of Spirit is worth 0.15 Spell power. So, Crit Rating is 433% more powerful in terms of DPS then Spirit.In short, by itemizing for Spirit instead of Crit Rating, Blizzard is making us give up quite a bit of DPS for a relatively minor amount of mana regen.I am under no illusion that Blizzard will convert all of the Spirit on the T8 gear to Crit Rating, but I think it would be reasonable to take the spirit off of one of the items and convert it to Crit Rating instead. In my opinion this would improve the set significantly.When I wrote my original SD vs Haste post last year Haste was a very misunderstood stat. Things have gotten better, but there still seems to be a lot of confusion regarding the stat. I regularly receive questions about the relative value of Haste vs Spell Power and how much we should stack of it. In this post I will try and present the math on haste. As always, if you math adverse please feel free to skip to the bottom for the TL:DR version.Assumptions/Disclaimers:
1. This analysis has been written using both Starfire and Wrath. Haste affects Starfire and Wrath very differently when Haste is added to the equation, due to Nature’s Grace. However, when calculating a relative value for haste I will assume a Starfire dominant rotation. For this reason, I will aso assume that the moonkin has the [Idol of the Shooting Star].2. I am excluding Moonfire and Insect Swarm from the calculations. I’ve wrestled with this choice for a while, but I don’t think it would have a big impact on the out come. While haste can have a large impact on both spells Damage per Cast Time, it has a very small impact on overall DPS due to infrequent casts.3. Crit chance is included in the calculation this time, since it impacts the cast time of spells. While it doesn’t have any impact on the DPS of Starfire, it has a significant impact on the DPS of Wrath since wrath is limited by the global cooldown (GCD) .4. Spell Hit is excluded from the calculation due to the fact that it affects Spell Damage and Spell Haste equally in terms of DPS. I ran the numbers with several levels of hit and the ratio between Spell Damage and Spell Haste is the same for all levels of Spell Hit used.5. I have made these calculations using this build: link
6. I’m using fairly entry level DPS stats for a fully raid buffed Moonkin. They are 2000 Spell Power, 35% Crit chance (38% for SF), 6% haste from gear, and 100% hit chance. On the armory this moonkin would probably have 1650 SP, 15% Crit chance, and 6% haste.
7. Calculations assume that the caster is level 80.Talents and Buffs Affecting Haste:
Celestial Focus – Provides 3% haste to the moonkin.
Improved Moonkin Aura – Provides 3% haste to those affected by Moonkin Aura.
Wrath of Air Totem – Provides 5% haste to castersFirst lets look at how haste affects our cast time for Starfire and Wrath.General Haste Rating Info:
* 32.79 haste rating = 1% haste* Spell Haste lowers a spells casting time and lowers the global cooldown. Haste cannot lower the global cooldown below 1 second. However it would take at least 1137 Haste Rating to lower the global cooldown to 1 second. This level is not possible to achieve long term with gear currently available in game.* Spell Haste has no affect on the damage caused by a single spell. It only changes the casting time.* Spell Haste has diminishing returns. Your first point of Spell Haste will affect your cast time more significantly then your second point.* Haste Rating is additive. Meaning if you have two pieces of gear each with 20 haste rating then you have a total of 40 haste rating which is equal to 1.22% haste.
* Haste affects are Multiplicative. All raiding moonkin should have Celestial Focus and Improved Moonkin From. Each of these talents provide 3% haste. When you combine that with your haste from gear, the affect is larger then most people thing. For example, lets assume you have 9% haste from gear, 3% from CF, 3% from Imp Moonkin Form, and 5% from Wrath of Air. This combination results in 21.4% haste instead of 20% as most people expect (1.09*1.03*1.03*1.05 = 1.214).
The Math:
(Please note that I have rounded these values to 4 digits to easy the reading. However, they are calculated using more. Therefore some of the math might appear to be slightly off, but it is due to the rounding.)As with all of the Spell DPS stats the value of Haste and Spell Power are highly dependent on each other. Obviously the amount of DPS you gain from one point of Spell Power increases the more Spell Haste you have since Spell Haste will decrease your cast time. The amount of DPS you gain from one point of Spell Haste increases with the amount of Spell Power you have because Spell Power increases how much damage your spells do per cast.For the entry level Moonkin I have described in the assumptions, 1 Point of Haste rating is worth about 0.8079 Spell Power. As gear improves this number will go up since Haste stacks very will with Spell Power. If we use the best gear currently available 1 point of Haste rating worth between 0.9000 and 0.9300 Spell Power.The Break-Even Points for Haste do still exist, but they are fairly difficult to predict and seem to be high enough that they don’t really matter.Gemming for Haste or eating haste food instead of Spell Power is generally a bad idea. Since the Itemization costs are so different and the Break-Even points so high, it is hard to imagine a point where the value of a Haste Gem could overcome a Spell Power gem.So, assuming you don’t have mana issues, Haste rating is a very good stat to have on your gear. It is very close in value to Spell power even at early levels of gear. However, it is better to use food buffs and gem sockets for Spell Power.Avg SF DPS = 6140.6120 / 2.3798 = 2580.3277 DPS
Avg SF DPS (+1 Haste) = 6140.6120 / 2.3791 = 2581.0701 DPSAvg W Dam = ((588 + (2000 * 0.6714))*(1.13*1.04*1.03)*(1 – 0.35)) + ((1285 + (2000 * 0.6714))*(1.13*1.04*1.03)*2.09*0.35)
Avg W Dam = (2337.15*(1 – 0.35)) + (4884.64*0.35) = 3228.7706Avg W DPS = 3228.7706/ 1.1757 = 2746.1973 DPS
Avg W DPS (+1 Haste) = 3228.7706/ 1.1755 = 2746.7522 DPSSF DPS = (((1 + 0.2)*1.1*1.04*1.03)*(1-0.38)+(((1 + 0.2)*1.1*1.04*1.03)*2.09*0.38))/2.3798
SF DPS = 1.9997/2.3798 = 0.8403 DPSWrath DPS = (((0.5714 + 0.1)*1.13*1.04*1.03)*(1-0.35)+(((0.5714 + 0.1)*1.13*1.04*1.03)*2.09*0.35))/1.1757
Wrath DPS = 1.1227/1.1757 = 0.9550 DPSAvg SF Cast Time = (Base CT – (0.5 * Crit Chance)) / ((1+(Haste Rating / 3279))*1.03*1.03*1.05)
Avg SF Cast Time = (3 – (0.5 * 0.38)) / (1.06*1.03*1.03*1.05)
Avg SF Cast Time = 2.8100 / 1.1809 = 2.3798 Seconds
Avg W Cast Time = (Base CT / ((1+(Haste Rating / 3279))*1.03*1.03*1.05))* (1-Crit Chance) + (1* Crit Chance)
Avg W Cast Time = (1.5 / (1.06*1.03*1.03*1.05))* (1-0.35) + (1 * 0.35)
Avg W Cast Time = (1.2703 * 0.65) + 0.35 = 1.1757 SecondsAvg SF Dam = ((1285 + (2000 * 1.2))*(1.1*1.04*1.03)*(1 – 0.38)) + ((1285 + (2000 * 1.2))*(1.1*1.04*1.03)*2.09*0.38)
Avg SF Dam = (4342.11*(1 – 0.38)) + (9075.01*0.38) = 6140.6120in a yellow socket to get the Socket bonus, but other then that it is currently not a good idea to Gem for Haste or eat Haste food. You would be better off gemming or eating for Spell Power.
It’s not a good idea because of itemization cost. In terms of Itemization cost Spell Power is cheaper then Haste rating. You can see this in Gems and in Buff Food. For example the Spell Power Food has 46 Spell Power, but the Haste food has only 40 haste. Therefore Haste rating has to be 12.5% more valuable then Spell Power for it to be worthwhile. The itemization difference in Gems is even higher. So, since we we can’t even meet the current break even point, there is no way that we will over come the itemization cost with gear currently available.In my opinion it is unlikely that we will ever be at a point where it is beneficial to gem for Haste instead of Spell power, because of how poorly Haste works with Wrath. However, it is impossible to know that since we don’t know what the gear will look like in Tier 8 or Tier 9TL:DR Version:Avg SF Cast Time (+1 Haste) = (3 – (0.5 * 0.38)) / (1.060305*1.03*1.03*1.05)
Avg SF Cast Time (+1 Haste) = 2.81 / 1.1811 = 2.3791 SecondsAvg W Cast Time (+1 Haste) = (1.5 / (1.060305*1.03*1.03*1.05))* (1-0.35) + (1 * 0.35)
Avg W Cast Time (+1 Haste) = (1.2700 * 0.65) + 0.35 = 1.1755 SecondsSo, if we now add a single point of Haste Rating, how does this change our average cast times. A single point of haste rating is equivalent to 0.03050% haste.How much additional DPS will you receive from an additional point of Spell Power?
Moonfury, Wrath of Cenarius, Master Shapeshifter, Earth and Moon and your Haste all affect the amount of DPS you gain from Spell Power. Starfire has a base Spell Power Coefficient of 1. So the additional damage from one point of Spell damage is:For Wrath the value of one Spell Power looks like this. Wrath has a coeffient of 0.5714.To learn this we need to find out what the average DPS is for Starfire and Wrath given the hypothetical moonkin in my assumptions. If you’ve looked at some of my prior theorycrafting posts these equations will be familiar to you.
If we compare these DPS values to the DPS values of a additional point of Spell Power we see that for Starfire, 1 point of Haste rating is worth about 0.8835 (0.7424 / 0.8403) Spell Power. For Wrath 1 point of Haste rating is worth about 0.5810 (0.5549 / 0.9550) Spell Power.
As you can see Haste rating has a much greater impact on Starfire then it does on Wrath. Since Wrath is now a significant part of our rotation, to get a real value for Haste rating we need to try and blend these two values together. After looking at my own WWS reports and some reports from other moonkin it seems that for most of us Starfire represents about 60% of our total damage output, and Wrath represents about 20% of our damage output. So if we use these to values as weights we can say that Haste Rating is worth about 0.8079 Spell Power ((0.8835 *0.75)+(0.5810 *.25)) for my hypothetical Moonkin.Break-Even Point for Haste:In the Burning Crusade we talked a lot about the Break-Even Point for haste. At that time it was easy to calculate, because we didn’t have to think about Wrath, and Nature’s Grace didn’t reduce the GCD. However, in Wrath of the Lich King it is an out of date concept.
How much additional DPS will you receive from an additional point of Haste Rating?So, by adding 1 point of Haste rating we increase the average DPS of Starfire by 0.7424 DPS (2581.0701 – 2580.3277). Wrath’s average DPS increase by 0.5549 (2746.7522 – 2746.1973) when you add an additional point of haste rating.In the Burning Crusade we talked a lot about the Break-Even Point for haste. At that time it was easy to calculate, because we didn’t have to think about Wrath, and Nature’s Grace didn’t reduce the GCD. However, in Wrath of the Lich King it is an out of date concept.Calculating the Break-Even Point for Starfire is still fairly easy. Assuming you have the Starfire Idol equipped the Break-Even Point for SF is:
For Starfire the normal cast time equation looks like this:
For Wrath the normal cast time is more complicated
SF Haste Break-Even = 2209 + Haste RatingFor Wrath it is much more complicated because Crit rating has such a huge impact on Wrath’s cast time. On top of that Haste and Nature’s Grace don’t stack very well for Wrath since Natures Grace already brings Wrath’s cast time down to the GCD. As a result the Break-Even Point for Wrath is very high and grows higher as your gear improves.The math is very complicated and I’m sure I would mess it up if I tried it, but using some trial and error I’ve found the Break-Even Point for Wrath with a 50% crit chance. It is:W Haste Break-Even = 4840 + (Haste Rating * 2.5)As you can see this value is much higher then the Starfire break even point. Using a little bit more trial and error the break even point I found if you combine the these to equations with SF being weighted 75% and Wrath being weighted 25%. It is:
Combined Haste Break-Even = 2631 + (Haste Rating * 1.2)
Currently the best quality gear allows for about 500 – 600 Haste Rating, and about 3000 Spell Power fully raid buffed. At which point Haste is still inferior to Spell Power in terms of DPS point for point.
Gemming and Eating for Haste:
I’ve seen several questions on the forums and such asking if Moonkin’s should Gem for Haste or Eat Haste food. The short answer is that it is ok to put a [Reckless Monarch Topaz] in a yellow socket to get the Socket bonus, but other then that it is currently not a good idea to Gem for Haste or eat Haste food. You would be better off gemming or eating for Spell Power.For the entry level Moonkin I have described in the assumptions, 1 Point of Haste rating is worth about 0.8079 Spell Power. As gear improves this number will go up since Haste stacks very will with Spell Power. If we use the best gear currently available 1 point of Haste rating worth between 0.9000 and 0.9300 Spell Power.Gemming for Haste or eating haste food instead of Spell Power is generally a bad idea. Since the Itemization costs are so different and the Break-Even points so high, it is hard to imagine a point where the value of a Haste Gem could overcome a Spell Power gem.In my opinion it is unlikely that we will ever be at a point where it is beneficial to gem for Haste instead of Spell power, because of how poorly Haste works with Wrath. However, it is impossible to know that since we don’t know what the gear will look like in Tier 8 or Tier 9TL:DR Version:The Break-Even Points for Haste do still exist, but they are fairly difficult to predict and seem to be high enough that they don’t really matter.
So, assuming you don’t have mana issues, Haste rating is a very good stat to have on your gear. It is very close in value to Spell power even at early levels of gear. However, it is better to use food buffs and gem sockets for Spell Power.
It’s not a good idea because of itemization cost. In terms of Itemization cost Spell Power is cheaper then Haste rating. You can see this in Gems and in Buff Food. For example the Spell Power Food has 46 Spell Power, but the Haste food has only 40 haste. Therefore Haste rating has to be 12.5% more valuable then Spell Power for it to be worthwhile. The itemization difference in Gems is even higher. So, since we we can’t even meet the current break even point, there is no way that we will over come the itemization cost with gear currently available.
Quot3Druid 