Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Its that time again, Performance Improvement Plan

Ok, I'll admit that I'm losing steam on the Plan. Patch 3.0.8 is looming over us and by the time this post gets published, may even be live. That brings so much change and uncertainty to playing a Hunter, it remains tough to focus on the here-and-now of improving what I've got.

But, its important to keep things moving, and now would be the worst time to let the plan go off the rails.

Review Previous Five Steps



1) Daily Mantra - I have not died in the fire for two weeks now. While not intending cease this pursuit, the mantra gets to take a rest.

2) Finish off review of Wishlist - I've come to the conclusion that I'm well geared. That's a good thing, because we all love pew pew that gear brings, plus shinies stroke the ego. Its a bad thing from the perspective of complexity. There are a couple clear improvements that are no-brainers. There are many items that provide a side-grade, or perhaps offer flexibility in the form of +hit or a socket. I think there's only three items I have left to do the analysis on to classify as: don't want, side-grade, upgrade.

3) Macro KC - I ended up only doing this for Steady Shot, since no matter what's going on, steady seems to sneak in there, even post patch 3.0.8.

4) Thaddius - I read over the wiki page for the fight and can't find any specific trick that might boost my numbers. In a naxx-10 run, I did find that having the other players die sure helps improve my position on Recount, but that's sorta cheating. I'll just have to accept that my output on this guy will suffer, and take solace in the fact that I generally don't fail at the ledge boss. (oops, just jinxed myself).

5) Purple is as Purple does - I replaced my last greenie the very same night I wrote my last plan update. Fury of the Five Flights off of OS25+2. Once patch 3.0.8 lands, my feral staff will have its stats changed to Hunter stats, and my last blue will out the door. In the process of looting FotFF, I dinged Epic!, but only by cheating and swapping some ilvl 200 and 213 trinkets and rings. Sue me.


Out-of-Plan Changes



Well, the biggest is Kel'Thuzad dropping Envoy of Mortality, which shall not become known as my new precious, as Arrowsong was substantially more beautiful. But, I'll take it!!!

And I think that's it.

Assess the Results



We fought Patchwerk before KT dropped the gun (natch).

5.2k DPS, ftw!

The majority of the night in Naxx-25 consisted of Brass and I taking turns at the top. And celebrating that this might be the last week we get to do it, woe is us. Actually, he'll generally stay on top even after the nerf, but I might have to go back to the formal Improvement Plan to get back up there. Cry me a river.


The real key at this point is understanding the timing of the encounter, rather than gear.

We kill Patchy in a smidge over 3 minutes.

This means I get one shot at Readiness.

Seems like its two BW's, and then we're at a point that the DPS lead calls for Heroism.

Save Readiness until near the end, and use it to trigger BW during Heroism for max results.

Maximizing the output becomes harder for fights that're less predictable for duration, and also mobility or other factors.

Like Grobbulus. How frustrating to get nailed by one of his farts immediately after triggering BW, and have to run all the way across the room to avoid blowing the raid up?


The New Steps



I'm not going to force it to be five steps anymore, but rather just go with what needs attention.

1) Pet Spec - During OS25+2, the Hunters were discussing pet specs that might make the fight tolerable. It really is awful on Beast Masters in here. Some additional magic resist might be good. It'll be tough to pick what to give up to get an additional two points for full resist, but I guess that's the fun of talent points, making compromises.

2) EJ Spreadsheet - A reader commented and emailed about the EJ Spreadsheet. I downloaded it and tried it out. It is very involved and quite complicated for a new person. I failed to get it to do anything. I think I'm going to try again, as it will be a very useful tool to weed out the last few upgrade vs side-grade decisions.

3) Sit and Wait - Yeah, 3.0.8 is just too dramatic a change to really do anything about (and I really don't want to go on the PTR to play), so its time to sit and wait, and keep in touch with the major Hunter resources to see what the general opinion is (aka, what's the new cookie cutter, and is it so divergent from my fun of uber pet that I cant stomach it).

And that's all I've got for now.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I'm one of those folk who like to get used to a new change when it happens, and not really worry about it too much beforehand.

(If I had a PTR team I might think differently, that'd be cool - do you know any of those that need a holy priest? :) )

That having been said, I do take the time to look at what is here and now and important with each patch update as it comes in as well.

I find it interesting to read other people's processes - are there addons that you use that help you research or maintain the information?

Valdesta
WoWGrrl's player blog