I finally breached 500 Arpen and decided it might be worth my time to respec and remove Arcane from my rotation. Here are the changes I’ve made:
GLYPHS: Swapped Glyph of Chimera Shot for Glyph of Steady Shot
TALENTS: Removed points from Improved Arcane and put one into Rapid Recup, one into Improved Steady Shot, and kept one point in Improved Arc, though that will probably get switched to Improved Hunter’s Mark very soon, since we have had so many hunters recently…
PET TALENTS: Swapped one point in Bloodthirsty for one point in Charge (unrelated to ArPen switch, but I figured I’d mention it)
No, I have not re-gemmed. I don’t feel that 540 ArPen is enough for me to warrant losing such a large amount of Agility, which stacks with buffs and provides two stats and not just one. Perhaps after a few more gear upgrades, I’ll consider it. Even then, I’m not sure it’s the right move, but I’ll do the research soon (and share it).
Between Saurfang the previous night and Saurfang the night after, I gained approximately 550 DPS. This is, of course, situational, as I’m certain my performance was anything but perfect on either night. We also had a different group makeup, which could account for a DPS change as well. However, 550 is still significant enough to warrant keeping the change for now and trying it again with the previous group makeup.
I did find that having 2 points in Rapid Recuperation instead of 1 made a HUGE difference in my mana efficiency, as I was having issues maintaining Dragonhawk after long pulls, and halfway through Saurfang. That could also account for some of the DPS increase, since I did not have to switch to Viper at all on the second night.
So many variables, so little time. I wish I could dive into all of this, but with my new semester starting up, I simply can’t put the same effort into it that I used to. I don’t like taking advice from others when I haven’t done the math myself, and that’s exactly why you shouldn’t simply do what I’ve done in this post and call it a night…make comparisons! Take notes! Do math! Run tests!
Tags: armor penetration, experimenting, respeccing
The Sunreavers
Venomhide Ravasaur
1000 Stone Keeper's Shards
Boned (10 player)
Epic
I’m in about the same position, currently sitting at a pre-proc 495 ArPen (roughly 35%, 43% with procs) and I switched to the no-Arcane Shot format. Though I had to spec 2/3 into Focused Aim as I lost hit when I replaced Mark Of Supremacy with Needle Encrusted Scorpion.
Once I get some more +Hit gear I can upgrade my 2/3 Imp Barrage to 3/3 and put a point into Imp Hunter’s Mark (or Efficiency or Hawk Eye or something).
This has increased my DPS significantly, of course the challenge is movement-heavy fights and timing my movement to match my AutoShots but with practice I think I’ll get there.
Like you I’m seeing roughly a 500dps increase on average, of course sometimes I do less than I did before, seeing as one factor upon which my DPS is now reliant are NES procs.
But all in all I like the change. I still of course keep Arcane Shot on my quick bars for kiting and killing pesky adds in Heroics with but overall my rotation feels tighter and it’s nice to know that Imp Steady Shot procs will always make use of Chimera.
My main goals now are to get Hit capped through gear and not talents (it bugs me to rely on talents for my Hit) and to practice movement/AutoShot timing.
Hey been thinking about switching to an arpen build myself but finding it hard to do myself. I have 544 arpen pre proc of trinkets but ive tried the rotation and the build and i still notice my steady shots not hitting has hard as my arcane. If you have any tips that could help me be greatly appricated.
From what I last heard, an ArP build isn’t worth switching for unless one is able to hit the hard cap (1300 with no trinket procs), or come very close.
Another thing to keep in mind about ArP is that it’s not moving-friendly. If your top 2 damaging shots are Auto Shot and Steady Shot, as we all know, it’s impossible to get these off if you find yourself constantly moving.
I, too, have thought about switching to an ArP build, but I’m too cheap to do so at the moment.
Oh..and I forgot to mention too.
Maybe you’ll have better luck than I did Nass, but I did the exact same pet talent change as you – swapping out Bloodthirsty for Charge. It seemed that Kiba lost happiness much faster, even during battles. The Mend Pet glyph would help some, but it took a few seconds to kick in and change his mood from yellow to green.
I never calculated the DPS loss but I found it to be annoying.
Yeah, I found the same thing happening to Ceallach. I also haven’t factored the DPS increase/decrease quite yet. If anything, I’d say keep it and simply bring food to feed him regularly (omg haven’t done that in like a year wtf).
I had no problem limiting my movement in the ICC fights. I generally don’t run around all willy-nilly, and when I did have to move and fire at the same time, I just punched an Arcane out until I could stand still. Generally, fire takes less than the GCD to move out of. I have to agree with Noah on that one. It’s a learned skill that the player is responsible for.
In regards to movement, I think it’s a good exercise to work on limiting movement. There are a lot of movement-intensive fights, but we also don’t need to run around like the proverbial headless chicken.
Run in increments when possible to allow AutoShot to fire. Get off Steadies when you can. All in all, Hunters can tighten up their movement. It’s hard but I’m finding working on it to be well worth doing.