I haven’t been as good about detailing my race for the block cap as I had been with my pursuit of the armor cap in the latter days of Wrath of the Lich King, but I am proud to report I’ve finally achieved my goal since the start of the Cataclysm: total combat table coverage.
It’s really hard to show in game because the Visual Combat Table addon is being funky, so enjoy this screenshot from my spreadsheet.
Raid buffed, I have 13.98% dodge + 14.01% parry + 69.48% block + 5% miss. This adds up to 102.47% combat table coverage — .07% over the cap, or 6 mastery too many. I also was able to completely regem to a stamina scheme (I can’t wait for the first LFD pugger to call me a stam-stacker) and activate all my socket bonuses. I’m ecstatic!
What allowed me to go through this joyous metamorphosis was picking up three new pieces last night: the Deflecting Brimstone Band from valor points, the Essence of the Eternal Flame from the Avengers quartermaster, and the Uncrushable Belt of Fury from Shannox. Though, mostly, it was the trinket. The other two just allowed me to shed a few more hybrid mastery gems to hybrid stamina gems.
Looking at my armory now I see a Puissant gem in a blue socket. I’ll have to fix that, but I need 14 or so more mastery first. (Enter the eye twitch.)
Anyone else block cap, yet? How’d you handle overflow mastery? Or, if not capped, how close are you?
So, what made you go for stamina over parry/dodge?
The steep DR on avoidance, not to mention the harder content we’re moving into which rewards higher hitpoint pools. I’d rather pick up 500 hitpoints rather than .09% dodge chance.
My only problem with that would be your healers are still healing the same hit points. With nothing oneshotting tanks now, stam is really outdated it seems. Being able to dodge/parry stacks of things. Like Decimation blade, is just an unbelievable breather for healers.
Even on AOE damg dodge and parry allow you to survive better when healers are doing smaller AOE heals to the raid.
This is of course coming from a 10 man guild where we don’t really have a dedicated tank healer so we don’t always have incoming heals.
You should start replacing gems once cap is reached having 1 stamina and 1 mastery trinkets equipped. Otherwise, you’ll be forced to keep those two mastery trinkets equipped for every encounter.
I’m ok with that right now, I’ve picked up a lot more stamina via socket bonuses and gems that I would have with just a stamina trinket. With a few more pieces I’ll have a little more flexibility.
I dunno – I’m going into more avoidance while staying close to cap because avoidance streaks can keep those stacks of various nasty things from building up. Baleroc in particular, once the stacks get high that extra dodge/parry is golden.
It’s a difference of taste, really. I’m pretty pessimistic, I like to plan for the worst contingencies.
.4% away from the cap here. For sure going to be upgrading a piece this week though (not sure which yet) so that’ll bump me over. Managed this with all socket bonuses, and only one mastery trinket (I’m too scared to go for 2 trinkets, although the Beth trinket may change my mind).
Really looking forward to being able to gem a bit more heavily for stam!
Oh, also – ever see yourself not using Mirror this tier? I’ve gotten so used to having it on pretty much every fight that I would feel naked without it… It’s such a ‘must have’ that I’m not sure what I’ll do next tier when it’s severely out of date.
In fact, the only fight this tier where the on-use isn’t super handy on a regular basis is probably Shannox (especially heroic (unless you like standing in fire traps)).
The mirror is useful on a myriad of fights, although I’d use the beth trinket over it for some, sadly it hasn’t dropped yet. It’s essential on Baleroc, very handy on Domo, not sure on Hc rag yet as we’ve only seen p2 sporadically. I’d prolly use the beth trinket on ryo, shannox, and then dps trinkets on alys. I’m a bit torn on beth, we generally kill it before I get into oneshot range from a blocked swing+aoe, so I’m tempted to go for the beth trinket there too.
It’s easily my sweetheart though, that mirror.
I love that Mirror. I will cling to it as much as I can this tier.
I’m about 4% away from cap at this point, missing that lovely trinket from rep or from Beth. Frustrating how a lot of 359 are better than 378 for me, though it makes our DK tank very happy.
I’m in the same boat. The DK is getting first dibs on everything!
I’m now over the cap thanks to double mastery trinkets: Mirrors + Beth trinket.
However, I’m struggling how to handle trinket switches. When I go Mastery/Stam I’m 2% under the cap, with double-mastery I’m well past the cap.
Annoying when I switch back and forth depending on the fight: I’ve handled via reforging the Mirror to Dodge, but still over….
Would you only consider yourself as having full CTC when you need external buffs to get there?
I’m at 102.47% with lavascale and kings alone. I prefer to get there with buffs I know I can guarantee rather than rely on raid buffs.
88 more mastery and I can forgo the lavascale completely and use hit/exp food. As it is I can already drop Elixir of the Master and go back to Steelskin flasks.
I’m actually using a couple of different sets at this point, one of which just came into existence tonight.
I’m sticking with dual mastery trinkets full time (TB trinket alongside beth trinket) and just socketing a ton of sta.
I use mastery food and am relying on raid buffs. We have a dk and warrior in raid, so I’m sticking with relying on battle shout or horn of winter. That means the current goal is generally aiming at 100.4-100.6 completely unbuffed.
If I need to flip my coverage around, I alternate between the pants from Shannox or the Tier set. The shannox pants (with the mastery elixir) give me close to 31% dodge + parry. That’s right about 192k buffed with 102.6% avoidance. I’ve actually been pushing for a setup like that specifically for heroic baleroc. We pulled him once and he made me cry on the inside.
My tier pants iteration allows me to ditch the mastery elixir so I can flask if needed.
Generally 191k with elixirs (prismatic + naga, esp for rhyo and alysrazor) and I can sub in the mastery/str use effect trinket for additional damage (instead of beth trinket), or 199k with a flask (preferred for shannox)
I was debating this as well, internally. I personally don’t trust warriors/DKs/shamans (they’re so shifty) so I’m uncomfortable depending on them for the 549 strength buff. However, I checked WoL, and the uptime on the buffs is around 98%. So it’s definitely up there, and I think I can account for it.
Well, my main squeeze is the warrior, and she wouldn’t suffer it falling off as that would hinder her dps. Hell hath no fury like an unbuffed fury.
Ha! Well said.
I reached the cap about a week ago or something. I was having a similar quandary, but I think I’ll bump my HP to 190-200k unbuffed for a good fat cushion.
I can’t help but think that most healers won’t notice a difference with even 1% extra dodge – they’ll just keep to their healing patterns and just overheal the dodged hit.
I’m now at the point that I’m CTC capped without buffs in my default set, using only one Mastery trinket. The problem is, I only use my “default” set for like 2 of our 6 heroic farm bossed, plus Ragnaros progression. So while I have excess Mastery when I AM using it, I can’t drop any excess from certain pieces without screwing over my other sets, which have to stretch a little yet.
Though, I did get two new 391′s tonight, so I might be able to not worry about it anymore. It’s ridiculous how huge the difference from a 371 average ilvl (which was me at the end of tier 11) to a 387 average ilvl (which is me now) really is, in terms of being able to cap.
I’m dripping with envy. Looking forward to when I hit that point.
Still 5% away from the cap, though should get revered and trinkets soon, though personally I’ll be going mastery -> avoidance, but that’s because as a healer I prefer to be on the tanks that take less damage overall, rather than those that have more hp and therefore able to take more hits before they die. However, hands and legs are pretty nice, while chest is double avoidance and shoulders and helm both are avoidance threat, which do you reckon you’ll go for for the very nice 4 set bonus?
Probably chest and shoulders, but I won’t use the 4set often. I’ll probably use it more situationally.
Heres my Armory link:
http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character/kaelthas/Bovinestorm/advanced
feel free to disect it at will but keep in mind I just picked up the Spindle and havent shifted gems around much recently..stoopid RL keeping me busy.
If you havent reached the CTC cap as yet but can get the Rep Trinks I would not hesitate to pick up both the mastery ones.YES…one is still Agi and it IS kinda usless…but the Mastery is sweet untill you can grab the Spindle from Beth.
And now I’m hard-capped on mastery, so now I’m going to start stacking stamina, and use hit food and Steelskin flasks.
What’s the bet Blizzard nerfs our mastery in 4.3?
/facepalm