Gear Upgrades

Anything relating to the physical - equipment, class balance, etc.
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Canamar
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Joined: Tue Dec 21, 2010 2:20 pm

Gear Upgrades

Post by Canamar »

As my guild (not high end by any means, but active raiders) continues to slog through UF and work on the HoT raids, I'm finding myself with increasing difficulties comparing gear to determine if it is an upgrade or not.

Based on the excellent posts on the boards here I have greatly improved my skills and dps as a mage and I don't think there are a ton of "silver bullets" left to make giant leaps in my dps. Thus I am left with the incremental increases in gear/augs. So from what I have gleaned from the site and other players in game, here are the calculations that I have been utilizing to determine an upgrade or not.

Simply put I have been looking at 3 stats and converting them into raw mana and comparing the gear. Using 1 hint = 2 spell dmg = 20 mana. I get a little leery dropping my spell dmg stat for more mana, but I also regularly run oom (fully raid buffed im around 51k mana, and spell damage is 320 i think).

How are you all comparing gear (aside from slam dunk across the board increases or better focus etc)?
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Danille
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Re: Gear Upgrades

Post by Danille »

Typically I will look at four areas in the order below:

Mana
Heroic Intellegence
Hit Points
Spell Damage

When looking at heroic intelligence its important to remember Heroic Intelligence:

-Increases mana pool
-Increases mana regen
-Increases the maximum amount of mana regen a character has

The increase in mana pool is not consistant and increases in a predetermined value in groups of four. They are:
28, 10, 22, 10 then the sequence repeats.

If you have an item with +14 heroic intelligence it goes like this:

1) 28
2) 38
3) 60
4) 70
5) 98
6) 108
7) 130
8) 140
9) 168
10) 178
11) 200
12) 210
13) 238
14) 248
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svenalo
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Re: Gear Upgrades

Post by svenalo »

I also look, in addition to those, for the best pet focus and best fire damage focus I can get hold of.
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Canamar
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Re: Gear Upgrades

Post by Canamar »

Thank you for the replies, especially the bit about the HInt irregular though repeatable mana increase. Helped me decide which augs to replace in what order. Still have some that will burn your eyes if I linked them
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Malleria
Arch Mage
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Re: Gear Upgrades

Post by Malleria »

Visibles you don't really have a choice, but for non-vis the primary stat I look for is spell damage. Typically there are several earrings and rings available each tier, and only one or two will be high spell damage. Shoulders there's usually a couple, one with high spell damage and one without.

If you're gearing without paying attention to the high spell damage items you're selling yourself short. They're worth waiting for. Let everyone else blow their loots on the bad items :P
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Sillaen
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Re: Gear Upgrades

Post by Sillaen »

I look at focus effect 1st and foremost. Example, at this time I refuse to upgrade my 90% - 85 fire focus for a 60% - 90 group one, even at the expense of 400ish mana.

For me it's:

Focus
HInt
Spell dmg
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Calebe
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Re: Gear Upgrades

Post by Calebe »

Focus effects first for me.

Pet focus (both EM and RS extension focus), fire focus, spell haste, and mana preservation are the main ones I look for first. Spell damage is down the list, I don't look for that as a deciding factor. Sure it is nice to get 12 extra damage on an item and it adds up, but if the item has spell haste or mana preservation, that would be a bigger upgrade then say a 12 spell damage then one with 2 for instance. Faster casting will make up the difference with more nukes cast in an event, and if mana is an issue one extra nuke would surpass the added damage from that item over the course of an event. Spell damage will go up with smart bidding on needed items, but I don't even look at that stat if the focus effect I better then I am currently using.

So if mana pres item drops and has 2 spell damage and one has 15 spell damage, if the mana pres one is going for a good price with only 2 spell damage, I will bid on it and take it and not worry over lost spell damage.

There is no right or wrong way, there is only your way for the way you play. If parsing is your goal, then spell damage is important but I would say spell haste is more important. If the event is long enough spell haste will allow an extra nuke or 2 to be thrown in wiping out the cumulative lost spell damage on that item.

Calebe
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svenalo
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Re: Gear Upgrades

Post by svenalo »

The only problem with det spell haste on the gear is it doesn't seem to matter a whole lot if you already got the Quick Damage aa's and similar for summoning stuff...I see absolutely no change in the cast times with mine worn and with it off.
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Goranothos
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Re: Gear Upgrades

Post by Goranothos »

Sillaen wrote:I look at focus effect 1st and foremost. Example, at this time I refuse to upgrade my 90% - 85 fire focus for a 60% - 90 group one, even at the expense of 400ish mana.
That makes perfect sense, but I always forget how focus degradation works. How much does your 90% at level 85 fire focus your level 90 Spear spell?
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Ghem and Boo
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Re: Gear Upgrades

Post by Ghem and Boo »

This is going to be a dumb question but, how does a few points of spell damage really matter on a 10k or better damage spell? Seems like a drop in the ocean to me but i have not played in a while.
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