Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Sunday, November 27, 2011
Update Failsafe Gearing Guide Maintankadin
My failsafe gearing guide at Maintankadin will be obsolete when 4.3 goes live. While I plan to update said guide accordingly, you'll have to accept some lag. I prefer to confirm that the failsafe gear is actually there to get, in the form I say it is in and at the cost I state it has.
Thursday, November 17, 2011
Loot update: 4.3 raid
Head over to MMO Champion for a read on the candy dropping from the upcoming Dragon Soul raid in patch 4.3.
Being pugadins we're likely to be most interested in the drop table for LFR. A short summary below:
Shield: It's as close to perfect as it can be. Ok, both gem-slots aren't yellow, and the socket bonus is dodge rating. Still, remember that we're likely to cap 102.4 even as pugging tanks, so excess mastery isn't as welcome as before.
Sword: Highest dps with RNG self healing instead of defensive stats. It's an interesting alternative.
Axe: Mastery and crit rating, the latter for reforging. I'm not entirely positive we'll be allowed to use the new spec-based need option for this one.
Bracers: What's there not to like about these ones?
Belt: Avoidance, avoidance, everywhere avoidance. I'm not entirely happy about these, but two yellow sockets are nice.
Belt: This is rather obviously a dps belt, and as such you shouldn't expect to be able to roll for it for a long time. When that time comes, however, I wonder if this belt isn't better than the tanking belt due to the mastery if we're sitting shy of the 102.4.
Shoulders: Another dual avoidance items, and again with a yellow socket. We can't forego mastery in too many slots if we want to hit the 102.4.
Shoulders: Dps shoulders for the mastery starved. Same story for this one as for the belt.
Feet: A pretty perfect pair of boots. Sure, dodge had been even better alongside the mastery, but some of our gear has to come with parry on it.
Ring: An absolutely superb ring. You want it.
Ring: The dps counterpart. If you can grab this one you can reforge away the hit-rating into dodge.
Trinket: Stamina with an RNG six second shield should you dip below 50%. That said, the shield soaks 43%, so it's rather sweet for fights where you're getting huge bursts of damage infrequently. I still dislike the RNG though.
Trinket: Stacking avoidance. 78 dodge rating on your attacks, and max ten stacks. If you're above 102.4 and have decided to go the MDR route, this is the item for you.
Trinket: Stamina with RNG mastery on your attacks. It's an unholy crapton of mastery, so on proc you'll hit 102.4 almost no matter how you decided to gear. We're talking in the order of 20% increased block chance here.
And the LFR drops tier 13 tokens as well.
Being pugadins we're likely to be most interested in the drop table for LFR. A short summary below:
Shield: It's as close to perfect as it can be. Ok, both gem-slots aren't yellow, and the socket bonus is dodge rating. Still, remember that we're likely to cap 102.4 even as pugging tanks, so excess mastery isn't as welcome as before.
Sword: Highest dps with RNG self healing instead of defensive stats. It's an interesting alternative.
Axe: Mastery and crit rating, the latter for reforging. I'm not entirely positive we'll be allowed to use the new spec-based need option for this one.
Bracers: What's there not to like about these ones?
Belt: Avoidance, avoidance, everywhere avoidance. I'm not entirely happy about these, but two yellow sockets are nice.
Belt: This is rather obviously a dps belt, and as such you shouldn't expect to be able to roll for it for a long time. When that time comes, however, I wonder if this belt isn't better than the tanking belt due to the mastery if we're sitting shy of the 102.4.
Shoulders: Another dual avoidance items, and again with a yellow socket. We can't forego mastery in too many slots if we want to hit the 102.4.
Shoulders: Dps shoulders for the mastery starved. Same story for this one as for the belt.
Feet: A pretty perfect pair of boots. Sure, dodge had been even better alongside the mastery, but some of our gear has to come with parry on it.
Ring: An absolutely superb ring. You want it.
Ring: The dps counterpart. If you can grab this one you can reforge away the hit-rating into dodge.
Trinket: Stamina with an RNG six second shield should you dip below 50%. That said, the shield soaks 43%, so it's rather sweet for fights where you're getting huge bursts of damage infrequently. I still dislike the RNG though.
Trinket: Stacking avoidance. 78 dodge rating on your attacks, and max ten stacks. If you're above 102.4 and have decided to go the MDR route, this is the item for you.
Trinket: Stamina with RNG mastery on your attacks. It's an unholy crapton of mastery, so on proc you'll hit 102.4 almost no matter how you decided to gear. We're talking in the order of 20% increased block chance here.
And the LFR drops tier 13 tokens as well.
Friday, November 11, 2011
Minor update on 4.3
The ending of season 10 has been pushed to November 29, which would make December 6 a likely date for 4.3 going live. December 7 for us in Europe.
Thursday, November 10, 2011
4.3 incoming
It would seem that 4.3 will be released soon.While the link pertains the end of PvP season 10 at November15 those seasons and PvE related major patches tend to follow eath other very closely. My estimate would be one week after season 10 is finished, so November 22 (or 23 for us in Europe).
Such an estimate would also correlate pretty well with the PTR receiving a Release Candidate.
Anyway, what will 4.3 mean for us pugging tankadins? Not all that much it would seem. Let's put the new content aside for a bit and just look at the tankadin. While Blizzard has decided to make a major overhaul come MoP, as the do every Xpac, they'll let us keep our rather insane mastery for 4.3. Say hello to 102.4 even as a pugadin. At the other hand, that also means if you take an unmitigated hit, then you'll be considered doing something wrong.
So we'll continue to be the holy tin-can with an oversized barn door as extra protection for, say another half a year or more. I'd guess they'll slap in some kind of micro content patch late 4.3, like the very last dragon-raid during WotLK. And, as usual, I expect whatever new mechanics are being implemented in MoP to go live in Cata around a month or so before MoP is released. So don't expect a major overhaul of our abilities until August - October 2012.
With Blizzard losing subscribers left and right I don't expect them fo keep us running the last major patch in Cata for a full year. That would be akin to corporate suicide, so I might be too pessimistic when guessing at August - October. But then, who in their right mind would even consider releasing a major patch for a computer game in July -- oops, ok, maybe, after all.
Such an estimate would also correlate pretty well with the PTR receiving a Release Candidate.
Anyway, what will 4.3 mean for us pugging tankadins? Not all that much it would seem. Let's put the new content aside for a bit and just look at the tankadin. While Blizzard has decided to make a major overhaul come MoP, as the do every Xpac, they'll let us keep our rather insane mastery for 4.3. Say hello to 102.4 even as a pugadin. At the other hand, that also means if you take an unmitigated hit, then you'll be considered doing something wrong.
So we'll continue to be the holy tin-can with an oversized barn door as extra protection for, say another half a year or more. I'd guess they'll slap in some kind of micro content patch late 4.3, like the very last dragon-raid during WotLK. And, as usual, I expect whatever new mechanics are being implemented in MoP to go live in Cata around a month or so before MoP is released. So don't expect a major overhaul of our abilities until August - October 2012.
With Blizzard losing subscribers left and right I don't expect them fo keep us running the last major patch in Cata for a full year. That would be akin to corporate suicide, so I might be too pessimistic when guessing at August - October. But then, who in their right mind would even consider releasing a major patch for a computer game in July -- oops, ok, maybe, after all.
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Standstill
I guess I'm not alone waiting for 4.3 and more or less merely going through the motions of playing the game at this time.
Even us casuals should be pretty much fully geared from Valor Points by now. I'm converting mine into CP for a slow upgrade in PvP gear, but by now it's more levelling alts and running random BG:s than actually trying to tank anything in a serious fashion.
To further aggravate the feeling of merely waiting, the announced Pandaren expansion kind of devalued the upcoming 4.3 as well. It feels like something that has to be done before what we're really waiting for arrives, and I suspect a fair number of players will leave the game as a result. Instead of waiting a couple of months we're now waiting for the lion's share of a year, because that seems a reasonable time before the next Xpac arrives. And a year is a long time waiting.
So things are at a standstill. There's very little discussion going on at Maintankadin, a sure sign in itself that there's very little going on at all. Hopefully the patch will liven up things a bit, but I'm not entirely psitive that'll be the case. And I wait.
Even us casuals should be pretty much fully geared from Valor Points by now. I'm converting mine into CP for a slow upgrade in PvP gear, but by now it's more levelling alts and running random BG:s than actually trying to tank anything in a serious fashion.
To further aggravate the feeling of merely waiting, the announced Pandaren expansion kind of devalued the upcoming 4.3 as well. It feels like something that has to be done before what we're really waiting for arrives, and I suspect a fair number of players will leave the game as a result. Instead of waiting a couple of months we're now waiting for the lion's share of a year, because that seems a reasonable time before the next Xpac arrives. And a year is a long time waiting.
So things are at a standstill. There's very little discussion going on at Maintankadin, a sure sign in itself that there's very little going on at all. Hopefully the patch will liven up things a bit, but I'm not entirely psitive that'll be the case. And I wait.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)