Thursday, December 11, 2008

A closer look at the Hunter Nerf

Alternate title: Is when I get mathematical


Ok, so a post at Chain Trap containing the mechanics of Steady Shot's calculation got me to thinking...

Steady Shot Damage = Unmodified Weapon Damage + Ammo + (Ranged Attack Power * %multiplier) + 252

I haven't verified if the formula is correct, but I'm trusting Chain Trap on this one, he's normally very reliable. And if the formula is wrong, its not the only place that this post is built on shaky ground.

The spreadsheet screenshot below contains some hard data such as my Ranged Weapon and Ammo, and some estimates such as my raid buffed Ranged Attack Power and the % contribution that Steady Shot makes to my overall damage output.

Steady's contribution varies wildly as encounter mobility requirements change, but 30% is a reasonable estimate based off of some recent WWS reports of OS and Naxx runs.

The estimate for Ranged Attack Power was taken from a snapshot I took on Tuesday's Naxx-25 raid while "at rest", that is to say that none of the Attack Power enhancers that're either on-use or that crop up as other players or pets to stuff during combat are in effect. Naturally this will vary wildly as the raid composition changes and as I use trinkets and other synergistic capabilities activate.



10.3%

Ouch. 10% is a lot.

And when you also factor in the changes to Pets and Cats in particular?

Much less scientific than my little spreadsheet, but off the cuff....

Kindred Spirits will reduce my kitty by 5%. Estimate that she's 30% of my damage, that's 1.5% reduction to overall.

Rake reduced, Kill Shot buffed - lets just call this a wash of +1% and -1% so its a net 0%.

Serpent's Swiftness will be 10% less attack speed bonus. I don't have access to any real theorycrafting reference right now, so lets just throw a dart at the wall and come up with.....this equates to 3% reduction in pet dps, equating to roughly 1% overall reduction.

And Bestial Wrath not linked to Readiness. BW gives 50% more damage output for 18 seconds. Readiness allows me to get an extra BW every 3 minutes...according to my calculations, that will reduce my DPS by 4.8% (again, I'm sure the theorycrafters have proven this more rigorously than I have, but I'm trying here, people). That does not take into any consideration how BW conserves mana, thus leading to additional long-term DPS due to less time in Viper. That kind of math is just too hard for me today.

And lastly, Improved Tracking. A flat out 3% dps increase I am willing to claim, however I'll have to find the points to move there, which for lack of any better estimation and I don't even know what 3 points it'll be yet, lets just say that moving those three costs me 1% dps, resulting in a net 2% increase. Fair?

Overall Impact

Steady Shot: -10.3%

Kindred Spirits: -1.5%

Serpent's Swiftness: -1%

BW / Readiness: -4.8%

Improved Tracking: +2%

TOTAL: -15.6%

Yuck

(A) That's too much. Despite my recent epeen post, I am consistently out-damaged by two of our Shadow Priests, Retribution Paladin, Fury Warrior, Rogue, and other BM Hunter (lol). Sure, our gear levels vary greatly, and the fights that we each excel at favor our class/spec in different ways, but 15.6% reduction is too much IMO.

(B) Its all good. Just gonna have to keep progressing that Improvement Plan, I suppose.

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