Prioritise SA & Ravage = Vengeance DPS?

[Zellviren]

I’m not necessarily basing this discussion on factual evidence, but I am coming from a position of relative security with regard to my own results and I’d like to see if others have tried this, if it’s accepted “canon” already or if, in fact, I’m really doing something wrong.

 

This post is about the value of prioritizing Sundering Assault and Ravage while playing PvE DPS as a Vengeance Juggernaut.

 

I’ve gone through a lot of posts, including some of the talk over at Sith Warrior, and I enjoyed reading Morsexy’s Juggernaut posts. With regard to the Vengeance “rotation” (a loose term at best), it appears that conventional wisdom is prioritizing certain abilities over others, but largely basing this prioritization off the average damage certain abilities do rather than any thought to their “role”.

 

Here’s what you get from cursory glances over the forums:

 

1) Juggernauts are underpowered – don’t play one if you want to be good.

2) Juggernauts are fine – don’t play one if you don’t want to put effort in.

3) Ravage, though a key skill in the tree, is rubbish – don’t use it at all.

4) Ravage, though not entirely useless, should be used but only two ticks.

5) Assault is what you use as a last resort when everything else is on CD.

6) Shatter and Impale are your best attacks, followed by Force Scream.

7) Smash is free and comes after Force Scream, but before it for AoE.

 

All told, this amounts to; subjective opinions are subjective; Ravage is underwhelming; Assault is a necessary evil; four skills are worth it, plus Sundering Assault.

 

Now, I totally accept that I may have been reading the guides wrong or misjudging the tooltips, but I was often finding that I needed Assault to prop up my rage income when there wasn’t much unavoidable damage, or Enrage wasn’t up. This was annoying, because Assault is garbage; sure, it does what it says on the tin, but I don’t want to use it because it’s terrible. I also found that either using Ravage for two ticks, or leaving it out altogether, was leaving dead GCD’s all over the place, GCD’s that needed filled with Assault again.

 

In short, Assault was seeing far too much use for my taste.

 

What I was starting to notice, however, was that Sundering Assault was lining up nicely with either of two things; two GCD’s, or a full Ravage. In other words, by prioritizing Sundering Assault (using it on cooldown) rather than just harder hitting abilities, you can slot in two attacks between each Sundering Assault and not actually lose much uptime on any of these attacks. The attacks I’m talking about are Shatter, Impale, Force Scream and Smash.

 

Ravage, though an anomaly, fits this category because it has no rage cost and fills the two GCD’s before you can use Sundering Assault again. This means that a general rotation looks like this:

 

SA > Sh > Imp > SA > FS > Sm > SA > Rav

 

The implication is that you can pretty much consider this as a four-attack rotation if you group up Shatter with Impale, and Force Scream with Smash.

 

SA > Sh/Imp > SA > FS/Sm > SA > Rav

 

And because Ravage frequently resets, it’s almost always available when you need it at no rage cost, and can be interchanged with FS/Sm. This made a huge change to my output, because I was never begging Enrage to come off cooldown and I never had to fall back on Assault (assuming the throw/charge start up). I’m not sure about DPS due to the lack of any reliable way of judging it, but the whole thing “felt” a million times better.

 

Ravage ceased being a crappy attack, and started being a cornerstone that made this work. Its final tick is stronger than Assault, which I’d only need if I was short on rage (which doesn’t happen) or had to fill a GCD prior to my next Sundering Assault (which I don’t if I use a full Ravage).

 

Now obviously, the odd Assault will probably still be needed in fights where there’s no source of incoming damage; most likely at the expense of Force Scream, because it’s the main rage burner outside of my best two attacks which I never want to delay. Ravage is never going to speed up because Juggernauts don’t stack alacrity, so it’s safely future proofed. All told, this realisation has made a large difference to me.

 

Anyway, I hope that was easy to follow. I was also hoping for commentary on this, even if it’s just “lol thats the way u shud do it nub” because, honestly, coming from a WoW background doesn’t really encourage you to look beyond the simple numbers of a DPS rotation.

 

Thanks for your time.

[Lacedemon]

*Waves*

 

Not so hot on Vengeance any more as I've not used it in a while but I'll give my 2c's espically with regards to rage gen.

 

Between Shien form and the name of the talent that escapes me which gives you one rage when taking AoE dmg assault sort of falls by the wayside. Another thing to consider is that when you get the 4 piece PvE set bonus Saber Throw no longer has a minimun range giving you a another decent rage builder.

 

When in say EV or KP even when you are not getting hit there will always be a **** ton of AoE dmg, so I'd definatly consider it worth while.

 

Whats your current build?

[Zellviren]

My work terminal doesn’t load torhead or Darth Hater properly, so I’ll link it when I get home. Needless to say, though, I forgot to add in Force Choke during the shake up. Like Ravage, it takes up the two GCD’s before your next Sundering Assault, but also has the benefit of generating rage at no cost.

[Quor]

I’m not necessarily basing this discussion on factual evidence, but I am coming from a position of relative security with regard to my own results and I’d like to see if others have tried this, if it’s accepted “canon” already or if, in fact, I’m really doing something wrong.

 

This post is about the value of prioritizing Sundering Assault and Ravage while playing PvE DPS as a Vengeance Juggernaut.

 

I’ve gone through a lot of posts, including some of the talk over at Sith Warrior, and I enjoyed reading Morsexy’s Juggernaut posts. With regard to the Vengeance “rotation” (a loose term at best), it appears that conventional wisdom is prioritizing certain abilities over others, but largely basing this prioritization off the average damage certain abilities do rather than any thought to their “role”.

 

Here’s what you get from cursory glances over the forums:

 

1) Juggernauts are underpowered – don’t play one if you want to be good.

2) Juggernauts are fine – don’t play one if you don’t want to put effort in.

3) Ravage, though a key skill in the tree, is rubbish – don’t use it at all.

4) Ravage, though not entirely useless, should be used but only two ticks.

5) Assault is what you use as a last resort when everything else is on CD.

6) Shatter and Impale are your best attacks, followed by Force Scream.

7) Smash is free and comes after Force Scream, but before it for AoE.

 

All told, this amounts to; subjective opinions are subjective; Ravage is underwhelming; Assault is a necessary evil; four skills are worth it, plus Sundering Assault.

 

Now, I totally accept that I may have been reading the guides wrong or misjudging the tooltips, but I was often finding that I needed Assault to prop up my rage income when there wasn’t much unavoidable damage, or Enrage wasn’t up. This was annoying, because Assault is garbage; sure, it does what it says on the tin, but I don’t want to use it because it’s terrible. I also found that either using Ravage for two ticks, or leaving it out altogether, was leaving dead GCD’s all over the place, GCD’s that needed filled with Assault again.

 

In short, Assault was seeing far too much use for my taste.

 

What I was starting to notice, however, was that Sundering Assault was lining up nicely with either of two things; two GCD’s, or a full Ravage. In other words, by prioritizing Sundering Assault (using it on cooldown) rather than just harder hitting abilities, you can slot in two attacks between each Sundering Assault and not actually lose much uptime on any of these attacks. The attacks I’m talking about are Shatter, Impale, Force Scream and Smash.

 

Ravage, though an anomaly, fits this category because it has no rage cost and fills the two GCD’s before you can use Sundering Assault again. This means that a general rotation looks like this:

 

SA > Sh > Imp > SA > FS > Sm > SA > Rav

 

The implication is that you can pretty much consider this as a four-attack rotation if you group up Shatter with Impale, and Force Scream with Smash.

 

SA > Sh/Imp > SA > FS/Sm > SA > Rav

 

And because Ravage frequently resets, it’s almost always available when you need it at no rage cost, and can be interchanged with FS/Sm. This made a huge change to my output, because I was never begging Enrage to come off cooldown and I never had to fall back on Assault (assuming the throw/charge start up). I’m not sure about DPS due to the lack of any reliable way of judging it, but the whole thing “felt” a million times better.

 

Ravage ceased being a crappy attack, and started being a cornerstone that made this work. Its final tick is stronger than Assault, which I’d only need if I was short on rage (which doesn’t happen) or had to fill a GCD prior to my next Sundering Assault (which I don’t if I use a full Ravage).

 

Now obviously, the odd Assault will probably still be needed in fights where there’s no source of incoming damage; most likely at the expense of Force Scream, because it’s the main rage burner outside of my best two attacks which I never want to delay. Ravage is never going to speed up because Juggernauts don’t stack alacrity, so it’s safely future proofed. All told, this realisation has made a large difference to me.

 

Anyway, I hope that was easy to follow. I was also hoping for commentary on this, even if it’s just “lol thats the way u shud do it nub” because, honestly, coming from a WoW background doesn’t really encourage you to look beyond the simple numbers of a DPS rotation.

 

Thanks for your time.

 

I've felt the same way about Ravage. Use it right after a Sunder and then Sunder again after Ravage finishes. With Impale, Shatter, Scream and Smash on CD, you're looking at gaining six rage from two Sunder's with a nice juicy Ravage in the middle. Thanks to Smash giving +1 rage talented in Shien you can almost completely avoid any use of Assault. It's even better in the odd situation where you have to get out of melee range for whatever reason, since that means you can at least get another charge in, if not Throw + charge.

[Zellviren]

I've felt the same way about Ravage. Use it right after a Sunder and then Sunder again after Ravage finishes. With Impale, Shatter, Scream and Smash on CD, you're looking at gaining six rage from two Sunder's with a nice juicy Ravage in the middle. Thanks to Smash giving +1 rage talented in Shien you can almost completely avoid any use of Assault. It's even better in the odd situation where you have to get out of melee range for whatever reason, since that means you can at least get another charge in, if not Throw + charge.

 

I’m glad I’m not the only person that’s looking at this (Lace is in my guild, but playing Rage). I read a lot of complaints about why Sundering Assault doesn’t just directly replace Assault at higher levels.

 

I’m coming round to the opinion that it does. o.O

[Zellviren]

As far as I can recall, this is the spec I'm running. I've deliberately left out Deadly Reprisal if that becomes a part of the topic, but a couple of other points here or there might be different.

 

Not much, though.

[Teioh_White]

I don't even have assault on my hot bar as Veng spec. To be honest, Veng spec is a boring 6 move rotation, but it does decent enough damage for those fights we don't need two tanks. For the record I:

 

Start with: Enrage-Charge-Sunder=12 rage start.

 

Rotation: Shatter-Smash-Sunder/Impale-Scream-Sunder/Ravage-(Sunder)/--repeat till dead.

Rage: 8 9 12 9 6 9 9

 

Pretty much can just sit there and do that forever, which is sorta nice. If ravage doesn't proc, i'll fill it in with a force choke. If that's down, i'll just fire off Vicious Slash and Saber throw.

 

That last sunder is really the only thing I play be ear. If my rage is at 9, sometimes i'll just skip it and go right into shatter again. Often in a fight i'll be taking some AoE damage of some sort, making it unnecessary, or it's early enough in the fight I can use enrage again and have it back by 20%. I like to keep rage high so I can fire off a Vicious Throw as fast as possible in the last 20%.

[oldskoolfunk]

As far as I can recall, this is the spec I'm running. I've deliberately left out Deadly Reprisal if that becomes a part of the topic, but a couple of other points here or there might be different.

 

Not much, though.

 

That is the exact same build I use! For fun I start off my beat downs a bit differently though.

 

Saber Throw -> Force Charge -> Sunder

 

Shatter -> Scream -> Sunder

 

Ravage -> Sunder

 

Impale -> Scream (yes it comes off cooldown by this time) -> Sunder

 

My follow up looks like...

 

Shatter -> Smash -> Sunder

 

Impale -> Scream -> Sunder

 

Ravage (Vicious Slash -> Assault as alternate if no Rampage Proc) -> Sunder

 

The follow up is repeat until dead. Change out Smash for Vicious Throw at 20% or juggle VT with Scream. If CC is involved I'll use Vicious Slash instead of Smash, but otherwise Smash is used for single target. Ravage hits a lot harder in practice than people give it credit. So far only Impale plus Vicious Throw out bursts Ravage for 3 seconds (the two skills 1.5 GCD x2 vs Ravage 3s animation). The only down side is that using a 1.5s GCD skill give you more wiggle room to use an interrupt or adapt to movement better than Ravage. *If* you can get the Ravage full effect it is worth it. Even having it clipped after the first 2 swings is worth it.

[SmellNoEvil]

I play Rage Jugs, so it may be a bit different for me, but imho Ravage is a good skill. only problem is, in pvp you rarely will be standing in the same spot long enough to get the full damage off. PvE its fine, but you get less out of it in pvp.

[SmellNoEvil]

I play Rage Jugs, so it may be a bit different for me, but imho Ravage is a good skill. only problem is, in pvp you rarely will be standing in the same spot long enough to get the full damage off. PvE its fine, but you get less out of it in pvp.

[Halefthaut]

I play Rage Jugs, so it may be a bit different for me, but imho Ravage is a good skill. only problem is, in pvp you rarely will be standing in the same spot long enough to get the full damage off. PvE its fine, but you get less out of it in pvp.

 

In Rage PVP Ravage is awesome, because executing it in the right time prevents knockbacks and some cc.

 

I read about people who skips the last tick of Ravage, thats bad to me. The last hit is the most damage so i always finish it (other skills are usually in CD anyways)

 

This is my priority

 

-Opener: Saber Throw, FCh. If boss knockbacks, repeat

 

1-Vicious Throw when possible

2-Sundering Assault

3-Shatter

4-Ravage

5-Impale

6-Force Scream

7-Smash(filler)

8-Force Choke (if soloing adds)

[Hardened]

I have a 7/31/3 biuld without rampage and with battlecry and the free chilling scream talent ( Hybrid pvp /pve) and I never use assault and rarely have to use ravage. I use vicious slash even less than ravage. I do use enrage sometimes if im feeling starved but most of the time in shien I have plenty of rage and that is without the aoe rage talent I happen to hae huddle and defening defence which also arent real useful dps talents but it works out well in pvp. I never really got into ravage. It has always been underwhelming. I use it as a filler if something has less than 3 secs on cd and I have a free gcd. Edited February 16, 2012 by Hardened

[Hardened]

Ravage is good for rage but for vengeance we have better abilities available that do more daamage in the time it takes for ravage to hit that last time.

[Zellviren]

Ravage is good for rage but for vengeance we have better abilities available that do more daamage in the time it takes for ravage to hit that last time.

 

From my count, I'm doubling up Shatter/Impale and Force Scream/Smash; they're pretty much being used on cooldown. What combination of two attacks does more damage than Ravage (3 seconds), ignoring the metronomic use of Sundering Assault?

[bliapis]

Personally when both sunder and smash is on CD, i go for ravage (Vengeance DPS)

[Elyx]

From my count, I'm doubling up Shatter/Impale and Force Scream/Smash; they're pretty much being used on cooldown. What combination of two attacks does more damage than Ravage (3 seconds), ignoring the metronomic use of Sundering Assault?

 

Fantastic thread btw! finally a thread talking about how to improve your DPS, rather then just gripe about things.

 

I think that's the key. It's not about whether ravage is better then X skill...it's about when everything else is on CD...do i ravage, or do i spam sunder/assault?

 

Course, the other option is vicious, but the question is...is the damage from 2 Vicious worth the cost of 6 rage, in comparison to a ravage over the same similar time frame?

 

Or what about a sunder/vicious? overall rage cost is nothing given the talented sunder...is that better, or are you dealing with a cooldown issue at that moment with sunder?

 

based on my play, i like it as well for the smoother flow like you mentioned above, and the "breather". a few seconds of free damage while you reassess the environment. But is it optimal all other things considered? And does the Optimal outweigh feel of play and execution?

[eatZecaai]

In Rage PVP Ravage is awesome, because executing it in the right time prevents knockbacks and some cc.

 

Noticed this too.

 

Also some classes, mainly melee dudes and gunnery troopers, have a tendency to not run away. Against them ravage goes through just fine, which is a nice, cheap way to bridge some cooldowns and still do ok'ish damage.

 

Ravage is a fairly situational skill in all specs. It's not a skill you base your rotations on. But there are more situations when it is usable then you'd expect.