Tuesday Plan Update

I say "tuesday" because I write one day, post the next. Such is life over here. /shrug

Seems that I write these puppies up on tuesdays, so here's another improvement plan update.

I'm at a strange place, performance wise.

Most of the obvious or solo-able things have been addressed. There's no more rep rewards (gear, helm arcanum, shoulder inscription) to grind out. My gear is pretty solid with fewer and fewer upgrade options available, several pieces are already best in slot as of the current patch. (3.0.2??)

On the gear front, I'm mostly swapping and fiddling to keep T7 set bonus intact while also maintaining a 263 hit rating.

And all this while watching a nerf bat swinging in our direction.

Oh, that....and I died in the mutha-f-ing fire last week on KT, and as a result, we didn't kill him due to lacking DPS and the Enrage Timer. /fail Just plain old lost focus and stood there like a turd in a camp fire, paying way too much attention to my pet and completely ignoring my own guy. /shame

Luckily, the experience gives me some ideas for what to put into the new version of the plan.

Review Previous Five Steps

1) Hodirs - ding. done. never again. In a strange twist of fate, I realize I made tons of money via those dailies and also the stacks upon stacks of icethorn, lichbloom, and saronite I gathered in the process. My Gatherer map is nearly wall-to-wall icons of saved node locations, to the point that I may need to shut it off because the map is unviewable.

2) Clean up Wishlist - This one is tricky. MaxDPS.com is flat out giving me some bad picks. I don't know if its viewing the world from a Survival perspective or what, but it is just giving flat out massive downgrades as best-in-slot. I started visiting each item that remains on my list in the WoW Head comparator. I'm about half way through it.

3) Green Trinket - I'm still sporting the greenie. The two best trinkets seem to be Darkmoon Greatness and Fury of the Five Flights off of Sartharion. I'm not putting too much energy into the Darkmoon avenue, and I'm crossing fingers for a FotFF drop and Loot Council love (forget about that dying in the fire thing, pretty please :-)

4) Melee Weps - Strange one here. Heigan dropped a staff. Very clearly a Druid staff. Very clearly not a Hunter staff, chock-a-block full of +strength. Brass says to take it. I'm a suspicious sort, and figure he's messing with me to have everybody laugh at the huntard who dies in the fire wants a strength staff. But, as it would turn out, the new patch will be changing this staff to a beautiful Hunter weapon. So it sits in my bank, likely to receive an Accuracy enchant, which is nothing to sneeze at.

5) T7 - Actually, the very same day I posted my previous plan update, and the same day that LC member joked on my beloved blog that it'll be a cold day in Helfire when I get another tier piece, the sun shined and I can haz T7. Since then, I've also gotten a third piece, which is nice for flexibility as I swap items in and out to work with the hit cap.

Out-of-Plan Changes

Jeez, I dunno. Its been a while, and lots has happened.

Um, I got a new helm to upgrade my week-old Arc-Scorched one.

I suppose it was out-of-plan to become dumb and stand in the fire.

Assess the Results

There were two Patchwerk fights to examine since the last plan update, with a variety of differences between the two attempts.

Kill #1 - 5k DPS. Just a smidge over 5k, as it were.

Kill #2 - 4.7k DPS.

I'm a bit at a loss of what was different between the two. Unfortunately, the 5k one was measured via Recount only, as it was vacation and we didn't have a WWS or WMO (WoW Meter Online) report for it.

For Kill #1, I was under the hit cap by about 30 points, but more heavy into Attack Power and Crit. So maybe that's it right there.

Kinda frustrating to dip back below 5k, but oh well. With the impending nerf, it was a fleeting joy at best.

However, during kill #2, the raid had 6, and very nearly 7, players with >4k DPS, and we killed him in 3:27, which is getting pretty fast. It actually changes the fight, since you get fewer of your cooldowns to pop.

Hmmm, I wonder. I wish I could remember how long Kill #1 was, maybe I got an extra Readiness for an extra Bestial Wrath, Kill Command, Rapid Fire and Kill Shot? If that were the case, that'd explain the difference right there.

So can everybody please slow down? I want to get to pop some more cooldowns :-)

The New Five Steps

1) Daily Mantra - Say it with me. 100 times each day. "I will not die in the fire."

2) Finish off review of Wishlist - I'd really like to know in advance whether I want a drop or not. Validating MaxDPS.com's advice is vital.

3) Macro KC - I've found myself losing seconds here and there forgetting to trigger Kill Command when its available. Need to change my Steady Shot, Arcane Shot, and Serpent Sting buttons to be macros that tie in KC. Small upgrade, but maybe reducing the variables I'm mentally tracking will allow me to better manage item #1.

4) Thaddius - I'm not sure what's the deal, but my DPS is awful on Thaddius fight. Every week, I'm way off during Thaddius. Granted, Brass drops a bunch on Thad also. The repositioning due to polarity shift favors Melee or DoT damage, however my numbers drop disproportionately. I'll have to see if there's anything I'm doing that is causing a problem.

5) Purple is as Purple does - I've got two non-epic items. One is Fang of Truth, which will be replaced as soon as patch 3.0.8 hits and my staff changes from Druid to Hunter gear. Last one is trinket. This is pretty passive approach though, because I really don't want to go after the massive cost of Darkmoon Greatness, so cross fingers for Sapphiron to drop my precious.