Mining vs engineering: an EH comparison
EH as most of you probably already know stands for Effective Health, which is basically how much raw damage a mob has to deal to kill you. It’s a pretty potent number for determining proper gearing, derived from your total HP and your total armor.
Now, as I’ve blogged previously, I’m planning to drop Mining and pick up Engineering (for the +800 armor to gloves, among other reasons). Some people around here (looking at you Logan!) have been arguing against the switch, and with excellent points at that. So I’ve been holding off on pulling the trigger because the prospect of losing 50 stamina seemed pretty daunting.
Finally though I sat down and crunched some numbers, and I think I finally have the ammunition I need to make the jump.
Here are the EH numbers I received from this awesome calculator on the Tanking Tips site for each scenario:
Mining (33274 HP/25074 Armor): 83428
Mining with Toughness affected by Kings (33324 HP/25074 Armor): 83553
Engineering (32704 HP/25874 Armor): 83572
So, no matter what, it’s an EH gain. I think I’m making the right choice.
Armory Feed
With numbers that close though BS might be a better choice… At least for the future when the epic gems are available.
Right now though for pure effective health Engineering > Mining > Blacksmithing.
I spent a LOT of gold getting BS up planning for the future. I think I have made the right choice. Since the numbers are so similar since you have other reasons to go with engineering then go for it. You can make me a Mechano-Hog.
@Rhidach
15 May 2009 at 1:24 pm #
Oh yeah Blacksmithing will be huge with the extra two +30 stam gems you’ll have. If I had that extra 60 stamina, my EH would be 83714, and with just those gems buffed by Kings it would be 83864. Making BSing far and away better than Engineering.
@PinkRaidFrames
15 May 2009 at 9:32 pm #
Rhidach! Stop ignoring JC’ing and BS’ing. ;-)
Once epic gems are available I’m betting on this being the best combo for tanks. It is only barely behind JC / Mining now without the two extra gems slots.
@PinkRaidFrames
15 May 2009 at 9:34 pm #
I should have also noted that BS+JCing provide excellent versatility.
Rhidach, stop trying to dump your gold on the thrash can… go invest it on something worth it! Been telling you about JC/BS like 3 threads ago.
Isn’t the 800 armor only effective against physical damage and 100% disregarded by magic damage, while the +50 stamina is +50 stamina no matter what damage-type you’re facing?
@Duclama: Thats exactly my point, Most bosses nowadays either have a lot of magical dmg, or use a mix of both Magic and ´Physical dmg ( Hodir comes to mind), so i find the “Raw” Stamina more useful and appealing, not just because of that, but because the more Armor you stack, the less Physical Dmg reduction you get, since it’s bound to Diminishing Returns, while the STA scales spectacularly well with both our Survivability and some talents that allow us to generate Aggro (although its never been an issue if you ask me, but more TPS means your braindead DPSers can cut loose earlier and hit harder, AND i get enough breathing room to pop my Self Salvation for the sweet 20% DMG reduction)
@Rhidach
18 May 2009 at 8:16 am #
@Logan: Listen, I know in terms of min-maxing I made a bad choice and the smarter money would have been to go BS. But I’m not in some bleeding-edge progression guild, I have the leeway where I can drop 500-odd HP if it means I get some extra utility for my character. The glove tinker is just a crutch for my argument, primarily I chose engineering because it’s fun for me.
@Rhidach:
Your post concetrated on the EH comparison between 50Sta and 800Armor. I wouldn’t have even posted my comment if the EH of those two possibilities had been mentioned in passing. But your post made it sound like that was the deciding factor.
If it’s fun for you, go for it. But your post sounded like you were saying, flat out, that the 800 Armor was better EH for a tankadin than 50 Stamina. Period.
Sorry for adding fuel to the fire.
@Rhidach: Man, i know its fun for you, sme way it was “fun” for me to use engineering (back when I was lvling up), but yeah, you made an argument on behalf of ENG as a “TANKING” profession, and yeah, you made your point about its benefit, and if you can spare the 500ish HP, go for it, i kow it wont make or break a character (specially since you can always drop tehe profession althogether and start again with another if you feel like it).
My point was regarding to min/maxing, and well, im not on a “Bleeding edge progression guild”, I mean, we have only killed 8 bosses on ULD 10, and the Flame Piñata on 25…
I picked up Engineering back in the day baceuse it was not just fun, but gave my paladin a couple of tools that we didnt have back then (Ranged pull anyone? hand of reckoning and Captain america signature move), gave me bombs for some stuns and a speed boost, had very nice headpieces with useful side bonus ( stealth detection), but now… its just “MEH”, at kleast for me, but i hope you enjoy it XD.
on a totally unrelated note, just got my albino drake because im lazy like that, and got my 4 A40 mounts
@Rhidach
18 May 2009 at 9:13 am #
@Duclama/Logan: Ah right, good point. I wasn’t intending that post to say “If you want to be a good tank, you must engineer!” it was more like “See this choice isn’t completely stupid, stop pointing out how dumb my decision is!” Sorry if you guys feel like I was misleading you.
@Rhidach
18 May 2009 at 9:14 am #
@Logan: Oh, and grats on your mounts. Going for the full 100?
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!! i want to have a life!
I’ve been engineering forever on my pally mostly cause I used to use the bombs when I was aoe grinding and now I just like the toolbox… and I’m too lazy to level something new.
Still, I’m LOVING the engi armor glove enchant. It’s the first time I can remember us having a BiS augment in any slot over another profession.