oofalong Posted October 22, 2015 Share Posted October 22, 2015 Hi All, I am surprised by the discontent about the 4.0 changes and playstyle of Annihilation | Watchman. Due to this, I am publishing the guide I have been furiously working on for the discipline a little earlier than I had intended. (This means there may be errors.) I have really enjoyed the new playstyle in 4.0. It is reminiscent of the 2.X in that our DoTs are shorter and I believe it will be easy to play, but difficult to master due to careful resource management to maximize our DPS. Plus, the elimination of Force Charge | Leap seems like a good thing to me so far as we no longer have to worry about that ability re-positioning us or being on CD when we actually need a gap closer. I will eventually copy some of the text into these forums, but for now it exists as a google doc because that is far easier to maintain and format. I welcome any feedback. Cheers, oof Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WiththeForc Posted October 22, 2015 Share Posted October 22, 2015 (edited) Nice to see guides going up already. Have a question though, on that google doc with the expected dps you get when you click on the augment link, is that 5.4k accurate? Reason I ask is because I'm in a lot worse gear than 216 (all 198s with some com gear spread around) using a fairly different opener and getting 6-6.1k and one of my friends is getting around the same. Overall my stats are fairly lower than those too. Edited October 22, 2015 by WiththeForc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oofalong Posted October 22, 2015 Author Share Posted October 22, 2015 Nice to see guides going up already. Have a question though, on that google doc with the expected dps you get when you click on the augment link, is that 5.4k accurate? Reason I ask is because I'm in a lot worse gear than 216 (all 198s with some com gear spread around) using a fairly different opener and getting 6-6.1k and one of my friends is getting around the same. Overall my stats are fairly lower than those too. The modeled DPS isn't a great indicator of actual DPS as it doesn't account for adrenals, Bloodthirst, the % damage increases from set bonuses and more. Currently, I broke the relic calculations so those aren't considered. For the most part these are all linear adjusts to our damage, which means it won't affect our gearing, which is the real reason the model exists. Still, maximizing the modeled by adjusting gear should indicate how to properly hear your toon even if the DPS # is lower than you'll see on a dummy parse. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WiththeForc Posted October 22, 2015 Share Posted October 22, 2015 The opener seems interesting. Think I might try that one out at some point. Assuming you're saving buffs till second annihilate? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oofalong Posted October 22, 2015 Author Share Posted October 22, 2015 (edited) The opener seems interesting. Think I might try that one out at some point. Assuming you're saving buffs till second annihilate? Honestly, I backed into the opener. I focused on what the core rotation would be then worked backwards. Based on 3.0 I presumed we wanted to get to our steady-state Annihilate | Merciless Slash as soon as possible. I saw the discussion in the other thread about your opener. I am going to analyze it more once I make sure nothing else is broken. EDIT: Fixed Accuracy and Stat Allocations Edited October 22, 2015 by oofalong Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WiththeForc Posted October 22, 2015 Share Posted October 22, 2015 (edited) Honestly, I backed into the opener. I focused on what the core rotation would be then worked backwards. Based on 3.0 I presumed we wanted to get to our steady-state Annihilate | Merciless Slash as soon as possible. I saw the discussion in the other thread about your opener. I am going to analyze it more once I make sure nothing else is broken. Incidentally, I screwed up the stats on Earpiece and Implants so my stat allocation may change a bit. Aight bud. Yeah, personally I like the opener I layed out since you can take full advantage of devious wounds and early bt for entire raid benefit, along with second anni auto crit still falling under the buffs and extra 2 stack tick on deadly saber. The only possible flaw I can personally see is that yes, annihilate will come in two gcds later, and I think it's the third annihilate you'd delay by 1gcd to reapply rupture Edited October 22, 2015 by WiththeForc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LunarAshes Posted October 23, 2015 Share Posted October 23, 2015 Hi All, I am surprised by the discontent about the 4.0 changes and playstyle of Annihilation | Watchman. Due to this, I am publishing the guide I have been furiously working on for the discipline a little earlier than I had intended. (This means there may be errors.) I have really enjoyed the new playstyle in 4.0. It is reminiscent of the 2.X in that our DoTs are shorter and I believe it will be easy to play, but difficult to master due to careful resource management to maximize our DPS. Plus, the elimination of Force Charge | Leap seems like a good thing to me so far as we no longer have to worry about that ability re-positioning us or being on CD when we actually need a gap closer. I will eventually copy some of the text into these forums, but for now it exists as a google doc because that is far easier to maintain and format. I welcome any feedback. Cheers, oof Just to give you a counter perspective on the role of Leap/Charge, I really liked being able to use it in melee range as part of the rotation because it looked (on Marauder) like an acrobatic forward flip, something which the supposedly most acrobatic class in the game woefully lacks. I also did a lot of PvP with it, even doing ranked matches when I got bored of Fury every game, and it really helps having a gap closer for those people kiting you at 5-10m distance - you don't need to use it for resource generation in PvP anyway due to all the CCs thrown at you giving you 4 rage each, it's more for the gap closing utility. Anyway, thanks for taking the time to do this. As always you're keeping the community informed and active even through our darkest times. I'm interested to see the role critical rating plays now, particularly considering that critical chance for our Berserk bleeds is added to our damage. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ardarell_Solo Posted October 23, 2015 Share Posted October 23, 2015 (edited) Hey Oofalong, great work as always, thanks for providing! I agree the new playstyle is pretty elegant, I enjoy playing my main character a lot more with it. We'll have to see about class balancing, but atm we seem to be in a pretty decent place dps wise from what I am seeing. I also completely agree with your opener and rotation. Aight bud. Yeah, personally I like the opener I layed out since you can take full advantage of devious wounds and early bt for entire raid benefit, along with second anni auto crit still falling under the buffs and extra 2 stack tick on deadly saber. The only possible flaw I can personally see is that yes, annihilate will come in two gcds later, and I think it's the third annihilate you'd delay by 1gcd to reapply rupture I see where you're coming from with this. However, though the first 10 secs are indeed stronger that way, you do lose a lot of DPS as a consequence later: - As you said you're delaying Rupture by one GCD in the 2nd Annihilate block - You're either delaying Rend by 2 GCDs in 4th block or Rupture by one again. Either way you're also delaying Ravage by one - Rend will conflict with Rupture 2 blocks later - You will have to delay Ravage again with Rend moving through the rotation. Imo "correct" positioning of Rupture, Rend and MS as early as possible are pretty important, as you don't want to delay or clip dots while having full uptime on Annihilate. Oofalong's opener has everything on cooldown right from the start with nothing ever conflicting. Here's the rotation I'm using at the moment: Parse Edited October 23, 2015 by Ardarell_Solo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TACeMossie Posted October 23, 2015 Share Posted October 23, 2015 Got a typo in your guide m8, you said Melt/Rend had a 15 sec CD when it has a 12 sec CD. Other than that, great job on getting such a comprehensive guide out so early, especially with all the changes the discipline went through. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WiththeForc Posted October 23, 2015 Share Posted October 23, 2015 (edited) Did my first HM SnV a little earlier with same gear, and was keeping up with/beating the more well geared snipers and pt in the group while I only had a 216 MH vs. their 220, so by no means is mara in a bad place pve-wise Edited October 23, 2015 by WiththeForc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WiththeForc Posted October 23, 2015 Share Posted October 23, 2015 (edited) Hey Oofalong, great work as always, thanks for providing! I agree the new playstyle is pretty elegant, I enjoy playing my main character a lot more with it. We'll have to see about class balancing, but atm we seem to be in a pretty decent place dps wise from what I am seeing. I also completely agree with your opener and rotation. I see where you're coming from with this. However, though the first 10 secs are indeed stronger that way, you do lose a lot of DPS as a consequence later: - As you said you're delaying Rupture by one GCD in the 2nd Annihilate block - You're either delaying Rend by 2 GCDs in 4th block or Rupture by one again. Either way you're also delaying Ravage by one - Rend will conflict with Rupture 2 blocks later - You will have to delay Ravage again with Rend moving through the rotation. Imo "correct" positioning of Rupture, Rend and MS as early as possible are pretty important, as you don't want to delay or clip dots while having full uptime on Annihilate. Oofalong's opener has everything on cooldown right from the start with nothing ever conflicting. Here's the rotation I'm using at the moment: Parse Just tested a little of both, and seeing roughly the same numbers from both, BUT I will definately say Oofalong's opener does help the rotation as a whole flow better. Edited October 23, 2015 by WiththeForc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oofalong Posted October 23, 2015 Author Share Posted October 23, 2015 Got a typo in your guide m8, you said Melt/Rend had a 15 sec CD when it has a 12 sec CD. Other than that, great job on getting such a comprehensive guide out so early, especially with all the changes the discipline went through. Thanks, I fixed the error. And, thanks for the compliment. Getting the guide done came at the expense of playing the game. I was at a work conference this week so all my laptop/hotel internet could handle was dummy parsing and spreadsheets Hey Oofalong, great work as always, thanks for providing! I agree the new playstyle is pretty elegant, I enjoy playing my main character a lot more with it. We'll have to see about class balancing, but atm we seem to be in a pretty decent place dps wise from what I am seeing. I also completely agree with your opener and rotation. Thanks, I should also point out I consulted with Adarell_Solo about the spec prior to publishing this. He deserves a lot of credit too, and he was the first to outline the opener and how easy it would segue to our core rotation. Also, Nepthen deserves some thanks for helping me edit this as well as other assistance. I am going to look into adjusting Rupture's position. Currently. we don't get Ravage under the Devious Wounds buff; if there's a way we can consistently do this I expect we'd see a nice DPS increase assuming we don't have to delay anything else. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Equeliber Posted October 23, 2015 Share Posted October 23, 2015 Hmm got a question, you said in your guide that Rupture damage was increased. But according to my tooltip I have lost almost a half from my dot. It was 4k+ over 6 seconds, now it says 2.7k over 9 seconds. I am not 65 yet (no early access) but it seems weird. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oofalong Posted October 23, 2015 Author Share Posted October 23, 2015 Hmm got a question, you said in your guide that Rupture damage was increased. But according to my tooltip I have lost almost a half from my dot. It was 4k+ over 6 seconds, now it says 2.7k over 9 seconds. I am not 65 yet (no early access) but it seems weird. Sorry, I should have been more clear. The weapon damage for Rupture remains as it did in 3.2.1 (although it will still scale based on level etc). The DoT damage ticks have been increased. That is, each tick hits harder now, but the damage is done over 9s instead of 6s. I'm not sure why you are seeing less total damage for the DoT. Although what are you comparing it to? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EenVooral Posted October 23, 2015 Share Posted October 23, 2015 Thanks Oofalong and El'ethon for the guide and information! As always, I bow in honor of greatness! Gonna delete (if I can figure out how...lol) my thread within the Class Forums so as to alleviate any confusion, etc. Now, just gotta figure out why I'm averaging 200+ more dps with my rotation than yours...think I may be clipping cauterize and/or delaying BD with the correct rotation/priority system. I do totally agree tho...these changes are definitely a major step in the right direction for the spec. Feels more dynamic and a lot more fun than the 3.x rotation. My only question for the Devs is their thinking behind Inspired Focus/Thirst for Rage, and it's placement within an optimal parse/boss encounter. Only ask that in terms of a recent podcast relating to the combat team and specifically "how they envision how ops are to be played," versus the community, etc. Would be interesting to hear/see how they view each class'/spec's rotations, and why. Anyways, thanks again! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oofalong Posted October 23, 2015 Author Share Posted October 23, 2015 Thanks Oofalong and El'ethon for the guide and information! As always, I bow in honor of greatness! Gonna delete (if I can figure out how...lol) my thread within the Class Forums so as to alleviate any confusion, etc. Now, just gotta figure out why I'm averaging 200+ more dps with my rotation than yours...think I may be clipping cauterize and/or delaying BD with the correct rotation/priority system. I do totally agree tho...these changes are definitely a major step in the right direction for the spec. Feels more dynamic and a lot more fun than the 3.x rotation. My only question for the Devs is their thinking behind Inspired Focus/Thirst for Rage, and it's placement within an optimal parse/boss encounter. Only ask that in terms of a recent podcast relating to the combat team and specifically "how they envision how ops are to be played," versus the community, etc. Would be interesting to hear/see how they view each class'/spec's rotations, and why. Anyways, thanks again! Thanks. Coincidentally, I just saw your thread. Had I seen it earlier I would have commented with what I could have. Sorry. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EenVooral Posted October 23, 2015 Share Posted October 23, 2015 Thanks. Coincidentally, I just saw your thread. Had I seen it earlier I would have commented with what I could have. Sorry. No worries! It had it's intended effect (peer pressure can be wonderful sometimes.) jk!!! Appreciate all of your's and El'ethon's efforts. I know a lot of ppl who have stayed with their sents/maras because of you two. Me, I'm a glutton for punishment...kinda why I made my Sent my main. LOL! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oofalong Posted October 23, 2015 Author Share Posted October 23, 2015 The modeled DPS isn't a great indicator of actual DPS as it doesn't account for adrenals, Bloodthirst, the % damage increases from set bonuses and more. Currently, I broke the relic calculations so those aren't considered. For the most part these are all linear adjusts to our damage, which means it won't affect our gearing, which is the real reason the model exists. Still, maximizing the modeled by adjusting gear should indicate how to properly hear your toon even if the DPS # is lower than you'll see on a dummy parse. I am slowly adding back in these buffs (although relics are still missing). The model now predicts DPS of just over 6,000 in 216s. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Walpurulis Posted October 23, 2015 Share Posted October 23, 2015 Yes yes the return of the maras\sents! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TACeMossie Posted October 23, 2015 Share Posted October 23, 2015 Sorry, I should have been more clear. The weapon damage for Rupture remains as it did in 3.2.1 (although it will still scale based on level etc). The DoT damage ticks have been increased. That is, each tick hits harder now, but the damage is done over 9s instead of 6s. I'm not sure why you are seeing less total damage for the DoT. Although what are you comparing it to? I'll take this one Oof along. In the 3.X cycle, the tooltip for cauterize / rupture was bugged. It was showing the damage for 6 ticks of the DoT when it only hit 3 times 4.X fixed the tooltip Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oofalong Posted October 23, 2015 Author Share Posted October 23, 2015 I'll take this one Oof along. In the 3.X cycle, the tooltip for cauterize / rupture was bugged. It was showing the damage for 6 ticks of the DoT when it only hit 3 times 4.X fixed the tooltip They never fixed this? I remember it was bugged at launch, but I guess I stopped paying attention to it a long time ago. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kaos_KidSWTOR Posted October 23, 2015 Share Posted October 23, 2015 Could we get a sideways picture of the Rotation? I can't exactly fit a vertical Opener and Rotation all on my second monitor to follow for parsing and training... Something like the Dulfy pictures would work well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joshmd Posted October 24, 2015 Share Posted October 24, 2015 (edited) Hey, I love the talk but I think from experience I agree with El'ethon's opener. That being said there is a lot of talk and theory crafting going around about crit or alacrity augs being better than mastery. I wanted to get your guys opinion as I am already getting close to 6k dps and only had my old 198 gear at the time. I am now sitting at 31% crit and 61% multiplier without those crit augs Edited October 24, 2015 by joshmd Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
g_mK Posted October 24, 2015 Share Posted October 24, 2015 Is good to see a nicer rotation compared to what we had in 3.0 . I'm still curious though on how does watchman compare to other specs currently Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Equeliber Posted October 24, 2015 Share Posted October 24, 2015 (edited) I'll take this one Oof along. In the 3.X cycle, the tooltip for cauterize / rupture was bugged. It was showing the damage for 6 ticks of the DoT when it only hit 3 times 4.X fixed the tooltip Thanks! Now it's clear. Edited October 24, 2015 by Equeliber Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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