Annihilation Alacrity Build + Rotation

[Excypher]

Annihilation Alacrity Build

 

A few people have asked for info about my build and rotation so here is a thread for all of this information consolidated.

 

The Alacrity build all started when looking closely at the animation for Force Rend. The addition of the skill seemed to slow the whole Annihilation rotation down. I was really frustrated by its simple animation and awkward fit, so started messing about with Alacrity. Using full Alacrity in ops and parsing "competitive numbers" in all encounters. I decided to take it one step further and took out all of my Overkill augments and replaced them with Alacrity ones. What started out as a bit of a joke, ended up making me enjoy the spec a bit more.

 

 

Gearing and Stats Priority :

 

Accuracy : 110% Force Accuracy always.

Surge : No more than 2 Surge enhancements.

Alacrity : 2 Enhancements Alacrity

Critical Rating : 100-200

Augments : 13 or 14 Advanced Alacrity Augment 36 (maybe 1 Accuracy if needed)

This should bring you to 870+ Alacrity rating.

(My Alacrity rating is currently 889 and this gives 9.93% Alacrity)

 

 

Abilities and Rotation:

 

Key Skills

 

 

• Deadly Saber
  
• Annihilate
  
• Force Rend
  
• Rupture
  
• Dual Saber Throw (DST)
  
• Battering assault
  
• Force Charge
  
• Ravage
  
• Assault
  
• Vicious Slash
  

 

 

Single Target Opener :

 

Pre build 30 stacks of Fury

 

Charge, Deadly Saber, Battering Assault, Rupture, Annihilate, Rend, Ravage, DST, Charge, Deadly Saber, Assault, Rupture, Annihilate, Battering Assault, Vicious Slash, Assault or Vicious Slash (depends on Rage), Assault, Deadly Saber, Rend, Annihilate, Rupture, DST, Charge, Annihilate, Ravage, Deadly Saber, Battering Assault, Annihilate

 

 

Rotation and Things to Remember :

 

Although you could script an entire Rotation, I prefer to think of it as a priority list.

 

Deadly saber and Annihilate on CD.

Reapply Rupture when it falls off.

Only use Force Rend when it procs. After the opener, If you are using Annihilate on CD it should line up almost perfectly.

 

If you are using Force Rend on Proc, the only bleed you really need to pay attention to is Rupture and the easiest way to reapply it is after 2 Annihilates. It is not optimal but saves on debuff staring if you find it awkward in a fight situtation.

 

Do not break Ravage, instead only choose to use it after you have just applied both Rupture and Rend dots and used an Annihilate.

 

Only use Berzerk on 3 stacks of Deadly Saber, If you use it in the opener after the first Annihilate, It should be ready 1-2 Globals for every 3 stacks of Deadly Saber. 1 stack of Deadly Saber deals barely any damage and wasting it on that is not advised, instead use it when Deadly Saber is on 3 stacks for maximum DPS. Use it like this on Bosses and on the Dummy.

 

Always make sure you have enough Rage to use Annihilate, Deadly Saber and Rupture when needed!!

 

 

Execute Phase (Sub 30%):

 

The Execute phase is identical to the normal rotation, although you use Vicious Throw as a filler instead of Vicious Slash. Do not prioritize Vicious Throw anymore, it does not contribute greatly to your DPS post 3.0. It will in fact hinder it due to Rage starvation.

However if a Mob is very very low on health, by all means spam it.

 

 

AoE Opener and Rotation:

 

Charge, Battering Assault, Rupture, Rend, Smash, Ravage (Gives time for DST to proc) DST

 

Skip Deadly saber, the dot does not spread and is useless here. Use Sweeping Slash as a filler.

Make sure to reapply Rupture and Rend, and then Smash again to re spread those dots.

 

 

Example Parse:

 

4809 DPS Although Torparse seems to be miscalculating the average dps atm (fix incoming 4th Jan)

Stats of the above parse

Generally, your "Damage per Ability" should list like this (highest damage first)

1. Annihilate

2. Deadly Saber

3. Force Rend

4/5. Ravage/Rupture (Bleeding)

6. DST

Your APM should be 50+

 

Overall I am really enjoying the way that Annihilation plays with the increase of speed and my DPS on the Dummy and Ops Bosses has been great. Alacrity is not going to fix your rotations, but its great fun to play with. I am so used to playing with the 9% increase that I infact think my mara is in super slow mo when I take it off. Anyway, have fun testing and let me know how you are getting on.

Edited January 3, 2015 by Excypher

[Musevisa]

Hi.

 

I have been following theese threads on Annihilation Mara.

Since we have no Mara left in our raid group I have switched so we wont miss the two awsome buffs they bring.

 

I feel i have tried almost everything, but i can't break the 4k mark. Either on dummy or in ops. Highest parse is just over 3.9k and almost 3.9k in bossfight. For Operation fights I know this is sufficient, but it bothers the hell out of me that i cant do more when i see what others are parsing(dont know if they can transfer that to bossfights).

 

My gear:

Old 2-set bonus 180

4-set bonus Ressurected

198 offhand

192 mainhand

192 implants/earpiece

Rest is more or less min/maxed 192/198

Stats:

Accuracy: 110.1

Crit: 23.25

Surge: 68.24

Bonus dmg: 1980.8

Strength: 4491

 

I have also tried with 8.68% alacrity. This gave me exactly the same results. Top parse with alacrity 3891. Top bossfight with alacrity 3860.

 

Not sure if i even need to bother my brain anymore with this But cant seem to let it go

 

If i follow Aradell's rotation or if i follow your rotation i get the same result. If i "wing it" and do A more priority approach i get the same. It could be that i have reached the limit of what my gear is capable of, but i dont belive that. I'm missing the last piece to get my 6-set bonus. Maybe that will help, but i'm not counting on it

 

I see that we are in almost same timezone(I'm in Norway). If you or any other uber Mara want to i will gladly join a TS/Mumble to get some tips and pointers

 

-GJ-

[Maguhl]

I am a PVP junkie and not so into Pve, but it get the idea, that you dont use the Setbonus in your Rotation.

Exept from that, GJ Pal. I have been experimenting also a little with alacrity and am happy to read, that you go that way too.

[nitratas]

Same problem Musevisa. Although i can reach 4,1k on best dummy parses i have no idea how its possible to do 4,7-4,8k.

My rotation is same as every guide describes, skill percentages are almost identical. Of course, there could be some wrongs here and there but in no way it should be 600-700 dps lower than the top parses.

 

Tried the full alacrity build and its true that its alot more fun. But the dps is exactly the same as with 0 alacrity.

[Excypher]

Hey all,

 

I havent tested this in PvP as I play Fury or Carnage for that. But when I can afford it I will buy a new set of Alac augs and test for pvp aswell.

 

If I could perhaps see some combat logs, I could maybe pinpoint where the issue is, Not sure how you can show these tho as Torparse is still buggy atm. If you wanna go to the website below in my Sig and private message me on Enjin, We could arrange logging to TS/Mumble for a talk about it all.

[Maguhl]

One alacrity augment 36 (Blue) loweres the cd on Skills for 0.9 sec.

It is a pro vs con, i am currently even experimenting with alacrity in the carnage build, although you get the 30% extra boost.

[Musevisa]

Hi and thanks for reply.

 

I'm using Parsec. Will check if there is a way to get logs.

I'm also quite new to Marauder, so I'm also thinking that i have a lot to learn. Did Carnage just for fun pre. 3.0, and only activly started playing after 3.0.

 

I will take you up on the offer for some teachings on TS/Mumble. Will send you a PM later this afternoon.

 

Thanks again

[Ardarell_Solo]

This looks interesting indeed, thanks for sharing!

 

If it's about the same DPS as with Mainstat augs, it could be a good way to make up for the spec's lost burst and target switching capabilities and thus be the superior build for encounters like Walkers / Underlurker / Commandeers / Torque (though you could argue you should go Concentration or Combat for those anyway).

 

As soon as I get the money to buy those alacrity augs (gearing up 6 toons is expensive ;-) I will definitely give it a try as well and report.

Edited January 5, 2015 by Ardarell_Solo

[Musevisa]

I am on TOFN btw

[DarkNecroCrusher]

All this makes me wanna try Combat with some more Alacrity for PvP, just to see if it could be better.

[nitratas]

All this makes me wanna try Combat with some more Alacrity for PvP, just to see if it could be better.

 

Nah, until they fix marauders survivability, my main goal as a carnage in pvp is go in, unleash some heavy ravages and blasts and die peacefully lol. If you stack alacrity your autocrits will be lot less powerful.

Well thats me though

[DarkNecroCrusher]

Nah, until they fix marauders survivability, my main goal as a carnage in pvp is go in, unleash some heavy ravages and blasts and die peacefully lol. If you stack alacrity your autocrits will be lot less powerful.

Well thats me though

 

I didn't say I'll go full alacrity =)

 

 

Now just to give you my test results and feelings :

 

I've tried with some alacrity in PvP with the Combat spec : it's just awesome !

 

Skills you couldn't use in the short time between your leap animation and the ennemy reaction can now be used just before beeing controlled or shut down (bump, stun, root + kitting).

 

In Combat, I have 8.16% alacrity with only 5 augments and 2 enhancements for 418 rating.

 

It really feels smoother, more fluid and helps to counter the server lags and ability delays.

 

Having a GCD of ~1.387 sec instead of 1.456 is just game changing (even if it's barely the same when talking about numbers, trust me,you can feel it when you are in the "melee-action-mode" time distorsion of your brain), and 5.16% more alacrity under Zen is kind of brutal (38.16% instead of 33% for a ~1.085 sec GCD instead of ~1.127).

 

It really helps to benefit from the whole 3 sec Precision window and allows a smoother Precision + MS + CB (or Execute) combo in addition to the reactivity it gives you.

 

Also, it feels like I don't lose too much DPS and that the speed up just compensates the bonus damage (around 1045 instead of 1100 => ~5%) and crit damage bonus (around 75% instead of 77% => ~2%) lost.

 

Maybe 2 augments more could be useful to go up to 9.3% (522 rating), I'm gonna test it.

 

 

Though it doesn't change the fact that we are squishy as hell and that our DCDs and utilities are the worst in the game, but it helps in term of QoL.

 

Hope we will get some love in a patch soon.

[mdeezil]

have tried this with 8 alacrity augs and 1 quick savant enhancement, got alac to 6% and i cant believe how much this smoothes out the "clunkyness" of how the rotations feel. Dps isnt that much better on a training dummy, but in ops im no longer buff staring , and am using allot less filler in the rotation as the gcd on specials is so fast . thanx for this tip, never thought a stat that was a waste pre-3.0 would figure in so huge now.

[johanlofdahl]

Skills you couldn't use in the short time between your leap animation and the ennemy reaction can now be used just before beeing controlled or shut down (bump, stun, root + kitting).

 

This especially sounds very nice for pvp instead of Leap in and get controlled you can now actually Leap in and do the control. Like gamechanging nice

 

Anyways I did a little bit of tinkering with the Alacrity just when 3.0 came out and I remember disliking it because I thought it would reduce the cooldown of all my abilities but alas, it appears to only reduce the Attack abilities.

 

Do you know how it works with Force Choke? And does the alacrity apply before or after cd-reducing utilities. Thinking with your 38.16% alacrity under Zerk you could reduce the CD on Force Choke with -15s utility to alternatively 22,2 sec (60s - 38,16% and then -15s from utility) or 27s other way around.

Edited January 8, 2015 by johanlofdahl

[Musevisa]

Thanks for the help yesterday Excypher!

 

Did some more practise around midnight(local time) and ended up on almost 4k.

But still in the 44APM area. Will se how it goes in raid tonight

[DarkNecroCrusher]

This especially sounds very nice for pvp instead of Leap in and get controlled you can now actually Leap in and do the control. Like gamechanging nice

 

Anyways I did a little bit of tinkering with the Alacrity just when 3.0 came out and I remember disliking it because I thought it would reduce the cooldown of all my abilities but alas, it appears to only reduce the Attack abilities.

 

Do you know how it works with Force Choke? And does the alacrity apply before or after cd-reducing utilities. Thinking with your 38.16% alacrity under Zerk you could reduce the CD on Force Choke with -15s utility to alternatively 22,2 sec (60s - 38,16% and then -15s from utility) or 27s other way around.

 

From what I've tested, it works like this :

 

CD with X% alacrity = CD/(1+(X/100))

 

It's a reduction by the inverse of your pure alacrity %.

 

It works the same on every skill affected by alacrity (so Force Choke, Awe, active skills, don't know for Pacify).

 

So with the utility, you have 45 seconds affected by 38.16% alacrity under Zen :

 

45/(1+(38.16/100)) = 32.57 seconds left

 

You can see that the effective CD reduction is 27.62% and not 38.16%.

 

Also, I've tested with 9.3%, but it is too much power lost.

 

Hope this will help.

Edited January 8, 2015 by DarkNecroCrusher

[Imasithbanana]

have tried this with 8 alacrity augs and 1 quick savant enhancement, got alac to 6% and i cant believe how much this smoothes out the "clunkyness" of how the rotations feel. Dps isnt that much better on a training dummy, but in ops im no longer buff staring , and am using allot less filler in the rotation as the gcd on specials is so fast . thanx for this tip, never thought a stat that was a waste pre-3.0 would figure in so huge now.

 

Pretty much this. However I'm carnage spec atm. I found that slow/clunkyness feeling a little less. Ran out of money so yea. Will have to try Anni at some point again.

 

Thanks.

[_ray_]

This thread has awakened my love for this spec once more. My dps had how from 3800 to 4200. Very happy indeed.

. A quick question. My current dps is around 4200 (48 apm) with following gear.

186 mh

198 oh

733 alac

No crit

353 surge

1850 tech dmg

Fulll 192 non bis with 2 old and 1 new set piece bonus.

Ruusan relics 198 eat piece and implants.

 

You think my dps is enough for this kinda gear setup?

Edited January 19, 2015 by _ray_

[Ardarell_Solo]

My Alacrity rating is currently 889 and this gives 9.93% Alacrity

 

Looking for exact numbers: What's the Cooldown on Ravage with this and how long is its Channel Time (unclipped)?

 

thx :-)

[Excypher]

This thread has awakened my love for this spec once more. My dps had how from 3800 to 4200. Very happy indeed.

. A quick question. My current dps is around 4200 (48 apm) with following gear.

186 mh

198 oh

733 alac

No crit

353 surge

1850 tech dmg

Fulll 192 non bis with 2 old and 1 new set piece bonus.

Ruusan relics 198 eat piece and implants.

 

You think my dps is enough for this kinda gear setup?

 

Heya, I'm very glad you are having fun with the spec!

 

What I feel could help is adding a bit of critical to your gear, if anything purely for the critical rage regeneration. For me this has made a nice difference in reducing the amount of assaults you use and increasing the heavy hitters per fight. Try that out and let me know how you get on

[Excypher]

Looking for exact numbers: What's the Cooldown on Ravage with this and how long is its Channel Time (unclipped)?

 

Ravage has a cd of 16.4 seconds and the channeled time is 2.73 seconds.

 

 

 

In regards to pvp, I play carnage spec with the force choke utility. I run with 965 alacrity rating which gives 13.61% alacrity. Force choke is on a 39.6s cd. If you use choke during a berzerk its cd is 31.3 seconds, The control here is nice. Also you can often get moves off before people have time to react. Brilliant for regs.

Edited January 19, 2015 by Excypher

[zhaiyan]

Ravage has a cd of 16.4 seconds and the channeled time is 2.73 seconds.

 

 

 

In regards to pvp, I play carnage spec with the force choke utility. I run with 965 alacrity rating which gives 13.61% alacrity. Force choke is on a 39.6s cd. If you use choke during a berzerk its cd is 31.3 seconds, The control here is nice. Also you can often get moves off before people have time to react. Brilliant for regs.

 

What about the damage of DB in Gore? Can it break 10k?

[Arikata]

Hey guys,

 

After reading this thread i decided to use alacrity in my stat build for watchman, using 14x alac augs (14x 52 = 728) makes this spec feel so much better and actually increased my dps. before using alac i was hitting 3.6-3.7k now i can hit 3.9k easy (my gear is by no means great either) 186mh 2x 192 set bonus DM implants 178 relics and 192/198 comm gear for the rest.

 

i would recommend to any watchman/anni sent/mara to try alacrity, it just makes the spec a whole lot less clunky.

[Excypher]

What about the damage of DB in Gore? Can it break 10k?

 

Yeah, often hits 10-12k with full 168 pvp gear and a 174 mainhand