Discipline in WotLK raiding?
2008-08-17 at 01:50:41 | In World of Warcraft | 10 CommentsTags: priest, World of Warcraft, WotLK
Since this post seems to have become quite popular in recent days, please remember that it has been written months ago!
Due to the talent Grace (have a peek over here) it seems blizzard wants discipline priests in WotLK raids.
To recap: The current incarnation of Grace reduces damage taken by 6% and increases healing done by 6% when we set a disc priest to do tank-healing.
To me, this is just crap.
Our former PvP talent tree, which was (actually since this is only the beta, it still ist ^^) a very nice talent tree – is now bended to be forcefully included in raids. The one problem with this: If you wanna raid as a disc, you will still specc a helluva lot different than a pvp disc priest!
So, we force someone to take a crap healing specc to get grace?
GREAT.
(and yes, disc sucks for PvE – no 16% freecasts for example…..)
WOTLK + CoH
2008-07-26 at 17:48:07 | In World of Warcraft | Leave a CommentTags: healing, priest, spell, World of Warcraft, WotLK
Yeah, acronyms!
So, I refrained from posting about this for some time essentially, because I simply could not believe Blizzard could really be SO stupid… And I was right in that regard at least *phew*.
However, I still do not think the changes are very… good… for the priest class.
Before going on a rant, let’s just recap what happened so far in regards to this spell:
First round:
Second round:
What does it mean?
Well, two things: First, CoH is very powerful right now. Given the “smart raidwide” change, CoH is clearly OP in the current beta. However, the 6 second cooldown would rank it in the “won’t use” category, because in is very design CoH is intended to be spammable.
Second: The “smart raidwide” change actually would not be fun to play. Come on, those people who are happy and fine with spamming CoH on the MT are already playing shamans…..
So please just leave CoH alone blizz…
Analysis: [Darkmoon Card: Blue Dragon]
2008-07-11 at 15:55:54 | In World of Warcraft | Leave a CommentTags: items, priest, spirit, World of Warcraft
Ok, today’s post is about [Darkmoon Card: Blue Dragon], or as I like to think about it, [Poor Man's Innervate].
First, to get the facts straight:
I will assume from my own testing and what I read, that the Blue Dragon does not have any internal cooldown. Also I will assume that there is no ppm normalization (which would mean a flash heal had only 50% of the chance to procc the trinket, as a prayer of healing would have).
A 2% chance means you can expect one proc every casts – but this is a statistical value meaning, you can have 5 procs in a row, or a full raid w/o anything at all. You should assume at least 50% of deviation in specific fights due to this!
Next, the areas of use we will look into:
First, your fight has to be long enough so you will negate any gains from waiting for a CD beforehand. In example, a 20 second fight will probably not proc the blue dragon, but you will easily be able to use your [Earring of Soulful Meditation] because you can wait out the cooldown before the fight begins.
Second, this trinket is a raw unpredictable mana regen trinket. If you need to do a lot of burst healing with longer periods of inactivity, you will gain neither plusheal / haste to improve your burst healing output, nor will it help you in your period of inactivity. Use a combination of the [Earring of Soulful Meditation] and the [Redeemer's Alchemist Stone] for example.
So, the primary area of use is a long time of very short heals. (Druids Lifeblooming anyone?)
There are a few other things we have to consider before hopping into the actual theorycrafting:
Since the trinket is proc based, you will always just have started your <a href=”http://dionadar.wordpress.com/mana-regen/#spirit”5 second rule when it proccs, and therefore your first 5 seconds are always spend at the Cards maximum utility.
Although you could wear a spirit on use trinket in your second slot to fire it just when blue dragon proccs, I will assume you do not, because there are other cases, where you could fire it just as well.
Let’s get started!
Number of procs:
From my usual time spent in the 5 second rule (75%+) we can deduce that 60% of time spent casting could be a pretty good average.
Also, I usually do Greater Heals, which take a bit less than 2.5 seconds in my mana regen gear.
Average Time Between two Procs := 50 * Casting Time / Time Spent Casting
This gives me a whopping 208 seconds on average between two casts!
Again, consider that using this trinket on fights below 300 seconds (5 minutes) can very well result in having a trinket which does nothing at all in that fight.
Strength of procs:
Essentially this is calculated very easily:
Mana regained by a Blue Dragon Proc while always casting := 3 * (OOC MP5 - IC MP5)
Where OOC MP5 stands for the mana regged in 5 seconds while not being in the 5 second rule and IC MP5 for the mana regged while being in the 5 second rule.
This value is even for Dionadar who is not very well spirit geared at 984 unbuffed.
Now, this has to be normalized for the 5 second rule:
Mana regained by a Blue Dragon Proc on average := 1 * (OOC MP5 - IC MP5) + 2 * Time spent in 5 second rule * (OOC MP5 - IC MP5)
The first summand stands for the first 5 seconds during which the 5 second rule is always running and the second summand stands for a statistical value for the remaining 10 seconds.
Dionadar would therefore regain 820 Spirit unbuffed.
Average MP5:
Average MP5 := 5 * Mana regained by a Blue Dragon Proc on average / Average Time Between two Procs
The value for an unbuffed Dionadar is 19.7 – which sucks!
WTF PEOPLE SAYZ BLUE DRAGON IMBA!?
*hem* yeah…
Did you notice I always said “unbuffed Dionadar” and “not very well spirit geared”?
The Blue Dragon card’s total formula is very spirit dependant if you look at it:
Average MP5 := (OOC MP5 - IC MP5 + 2 * Time spent in 5 second rule * (OOC MP5 - IC MP5)) * Time Spent Casting / (10 * Casting Time)
Therefore this value scales drastically with gear:
Average Blue Dragon MP5 for someone with better gear := 30
The input for this 30 MP5 answer is not taken out of thin air, but from a really good equipped priest on my server. And yes, this is still unbuffed. If you were to add [Elixir of Draenic Wisdom], a Spirit Buff, Kings, MotW and an Intelligence buff, this goes up even further.
However, there is something else we could optimize:
Usage!
Let’s just assume for a second that with potting and enough innervates, etc pp my poor unbuffed priest had to do CoH spamming for a longer time:
MP5 in this use case: 70.3!!
Now add another killer:
We will assume a buffed priest with about 100 haste and a (buffed) difference of 600 MP5 between IC and OOC, doing CoH Spamming:
Average MP5 := (600 + 2 * 100% * 600) * 100% / (10 * 1.4)
This gets an unbelievable value of 128.6 MP5.
Conclusion
[Darkmoon Card: Blue Dragon] is an extremely gear and behaviour dependant trinket, which seems to get more powerful as content progresses – maxing out in Sunwell with CoH spamming and long fights which do not allow you to slack.
Spell Haste & Sunwell Trash
2008-07-08 at 18:42:32 | In World of Warcraft | 2 CommentsTags: healing, priest, spell haste, World of Warcraft
It has become quite popular on my server to farm sunwell trash mobs up until the first boss – this way nobody gets an ID, but the trash still drops quite lovely loot (like my newest precious: Wand of Cleansing Light).
Ok, but what has spell haste to do with sunwell trash?
It is actually quite simple: For a healing priest, all you need to do is spamm circle of healing and your occasional flash heal. Mana is usually not an issue, because those fights are pretty short – or so strongly CC-based that you could regen to full anyways. In many cases though, the fastest cast wins, and the rost goes right into the twisting nether (of overhealing).
Yeah, and guess who got the fastest flash heal / highest CoH casting frequency?
Exactly, the guy with the spell haste.
Cheers to overheal.
Juggling Torches (because we are cool!)
2008-06-24 at 13:00:54 | In Guides, World of Warcraft | Leave a CommentTags: howto, quest, World of Warcraft
Ok, I have heard several people moin about how hard it is to get that darn torch juggling game right – and truly so, considering that it took me almost an hour to get the 4 catches right – and the 10 cost me another half hour at deepest midnight!
So, here is the recipe which I managed to cook up:
10% Luck: Well the game does depend a bit upon luck, as does everything in life 
30% Solitude: If you got some [insert your most rude swear word right here] that manages to blow up right in the target zone of one of your last throws, you better have a solid steel table (my wood table already shows really nasty bite marks, you know…)
60% Simple Tricks:
Trick Number one: You need to get a bit ahead of the torch (being right where you might think it lands usually does not work, since your FEET need to be at the landing point and you cannot get a real overhead view, it is always slightly tilted.)
Trick Number two: The torches throw shadows… It is much easier to follow shadows on the ground than to follow torches in the air…
Hoping to have saved you a bit of frustration
Latency goes Dooowwwnnn
2008-06-21 at 13:19:33 | In Guides, World of Warcraft | Leave a CommentTags: howto, Latency, World of Warcraft
Impressed?
Ok, enough showing off, here is what might help you get your latency down by a two-digit percentage:
A. Vista Autotuning: This will only make sense if you run vista. Really. Actually it will disable a feature that is supposed to improve bandwidth on highly used connections by reducing the amount of control flow. This might reduce your throughput i.e. when copying files on your local network or downloading larger files from the internet.
In an elevated command prompt simply type or copy and paste (pasting in a command prompt works via right click->paste):
netsh int tcp set global autotuninglevel=disabled
B. TCP Ack Frequency: TCP (Transmission Control Protocol) numbers all data packages that exit your computer. To confirm that a package was received, the other side sends a so called ACK package (from acknowledge) to inform the sender, that everything up to a certain number of packages was received.
Example:
Sender: Sends packages 1-5
Receiver: Receives packages 1-2 and sends an ACK for 2, receives 3-4 and sends an ACK for 4.
(5 was lost)
some time later the sender just resends 5, because it never got ACKed.
Now, the receiver in our example used a tcp ack frequency of 2 - he received 4 packages before sending his ACK - actually this is totally acceptable behavior and reduces the amount of useless garbage on your lines.
In the example, the receiver used the same TCP Ack Frequency that Windows uses – a very good compromise for most situations. However, World of Warcraft depends more upon fast answers than a high throughput, so lowering your tcp ack frequency can very probably reduce your latency – for every second package.
To do so, you first need to determine your IP address for the given network adapter using ipconfig or a similar tool. If you are unable to definitely determine the ip address of the network adapter used for playing world of warcraft, do not continue!
After this, open a little program called regedit by typing regedit into your vista start search (the text box which is in your start menu) and hitting Ctrl+Shift+Enter to launch it elevated. Browse the folder structure on the left as you would browse your local folders.
Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Tcpip\Parameters\Interfaces.
In this folder, there are several subfolders which all wear cryptic names, and you will need to identify by browsing into the interfaces and searching for the ip you noted in step one. As soon as you managed to identify the wanted interface, look for a key called “TcpAckFrequency” – if none exists create it by hitting Edit->New->DWORD (32bit) VALUE (this might be called slightly different in your regedit, but it will always contain DWORD) and creating this value.
Now edit it to be “1″.
REVERTING A. Vista Autotuning:In an elevated command prompt simply type or copy and paste (pasting in a command prompt works via right click->paste):
netsh int tcp set global autotuninglevel=enabled
REVERTING B. TCP Ack Frequency: Edit the TcpAckFrequency to “2″ or simply delete it.
Dead Ghosts, Living Ghosts – and something in between
2008-06-17 at 22:29:11 | In World of Warcraft | Leave a CommentTags: Bug, priest, Spirit of Redemption, World of Warcraft
Everybody who plays World of Warcraft sooner or later dies.
Especially if you do any kind of Battleground.
It sounds kinda weird to state it like that, but sadly this is very, very true 
Usually you get your “Ghost” debuff, swear loudly, sometimes bite into things (You remember that little girl from “A Series of Unfortunate Events”? She played way to much PvP…) and get your ghost to wherever you want to get resurrected – in battlegrounds you usually just wait (for your statistical 15 seconds – and felt 12 minutes) and game on.
If for some reason – like being raidspecced – you got Spirit of Redemption specced – hey, lucky you! Up to 15 seconds (minus lag equals maybe 12 or so of effective use, minus maybe still being counterspelled…) of totally uninterrupted – and uninterruptable – healing.
Bliss.
Oh, of course, you just might get teleported to a graveyard the second your Spirit of Redemption procs….
Although that does not seem to be such big of a deal, it can lead to desastrous consequences:
If this happens (as of yet I had only have it happen to me in alterac valley btw) you will not be considered “dead” – whilst being a Spirit of Redemption (that cannot be hurt or killed…)
And you stay dead.
You might wait for the Spirit of Redemption Buff to wear off – but you will just die and become a dead, dead ghost….
You might wait for the resurrection timer multiple times (remember the statistical 15 seconds? Well, now its up to YOU! Wait however long you want!) but you will stay a very dead piece of ghost…
Ok, Problemsolving 101: Move to a different graveyard!
Problemsolving 102: Notice you cannot move and call a game master.
Problemsolving 103: Realise the game master may be able to resurrect you and teleport you to your starting cave – but he cannot restore your ability to act (“You are not in control of your actions!”, mkay?)… Bite the table and silently cry….
Oh, and in case your GM offers you to take you out of the battleground to end your problems: Don’t throw curses at him, he is only trying to help…
Yeah, one thing at the end: Even if you are alive, get the General’s Warcry and everything…
You cannot even use the fucking 40000 honor insignia to remove the fucking “You are not in control of your actions!” annoyance!
*Ehm* sorry for the swearing to our american friends which will probably have a cardiac arrest at the notion of someone saying the “F-Word” where children below 42 might read it…
Update: Since I had more fun in alterac valley, there are a few pictures in the thread I took today (see above) and an addition down here:
It was suggested my latency might be the issue, since nobody else seems to know of the problem – well, to refute that:
Update 2: Well, happened again – but this time I was fast enough for a screeny!
Also, I had a bit of fun with netmon 3.1 during the time – see the full result on the official forums (german), the short recap:
1 out of 156000 packets was a tcp retransmit…
signal-to-noise ratio seems good (8 db)
Sooo, line does not seem to be the problem!
“I have got enough Manareg”
2008-05-22 at 14:30:40 | In World of Warcraft | Leave a CommentTags: healing, mana regeneration, priest, World of Warcraft
Several times in the last few weeks I have heard such a statement in our raid. “I have got enough Manareg” or “I will now ditch half a dozen points of Manareg for a dozen points of plus heal, I do not go OOM anyways!”
Well guess what: They were wrong.
Horribly wrong.
Now, why do people make such a statement that obviously will get destroyed in the most obvious and painful way possible?
First, our raid specifically was doing T5 content + the proudmore fights in Hyjal at that point in time – we had people build up more stam before entering BT, which proved to be a good decision, since our first week in BT took 3 bosses’ lives.
However, T5 meant people were overgeared for most fights, so yes, in those fights we had more than enough mana regen. The fights were people were taken to do something they had not done before were all done with the 100% spirit boost…
Combine that with:
Second, the overall situation. The 2.4 Spirit boost had just happened together with improvements to the shaman’s water shield… Yeah, that feels like we are all-powerful and will never, ever go OOM again, huh?
There is just one tiny problem: You can always just step up your healing output, and you will go OOM again!
Oh, and of course: New encounters will force you to step up your output in all regions, healing among them. Otherwise the new encounters would not be any harder than the old ones…
So, if you ever feel like having infite mana again, just remember: The next boss fight is already waiting…
Stamina and Priests
2008-05-17 at 19:13:51 | In World of Warcraft | 7 CommentsTags: itemization, priest, World of Warcraft
Ever since items like the Primal Mooncloth Set have priests been trained that stamina is just a waste of item points.
And, not to be offensive, this is quite true!
As long as you do neither do pvp nor get past T5 content.
Ouch, that one must have hurt a few people – at least that realization did hurt me when it hit.
Well, first PvP – this is quite obvious since stamina is the single most important stat besides Resilience, after all we priests are first focus for many groups. Anyone who does not realize this, simply should not do PvP ^^
But why would priests need more stamina once we get past T5 content?
Simply, because many T6+ encounters expect you to have a certain hp reserve. Take Naj’entus for example:
Naj’entus has several abilities, which damage the raid, but the most prominant is this (Source: WoW Wiki and own experience):
Tidal Shield : Renders Naj’entus immune to everything, regenerates health, deals 8500 frost damage to all raid members when broken, 60 sec cooldown
Now, 8500 dmg is more than many priests in pmc posses fully raid buffed!
Ergo: PMC priests get pwned by this boss very, very badly.
So, if you ever wondered why T6 and similar items like the itemlevel 141 Sunwell Badge rewards have so much “useless” stamina on them – there you go!
Beautiful WotLK video by Boubouille
2008-05-10 at 23:00:02 | In World of Warcraft | Leave a CommentTags: Video, World of Warcraft
Now, I promised myself I would not repost stupid WoW videos – but this time I just cannot resist
Boubouille (damn I should have used copy&paste, i bet I have mistyped that name) from mmo-champion.com uploaded a really beautiful trailer to WotLK: Video.
There is a little Button titled “HD” on the top right of the video frame – if you can, enable it…
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