1k TPS Part Two

I made a flurry of posts a while back about the mythical 1k tps golden norm that seems so prevalent. My main query was "I'm not a noob, so are you guys exagerating something when you say you can sustain 1k tps or am I missing something important?"

Back then, I was a KZ tank working on Gruul; spec'ed for a balance of survivability and threat, with my gear focused on effective health. And things were fine, really - most of my raid couldn't keep up. But I kept reading posts of people saying they had these crazy TPS numbers, and I averaged around 800-1000 tps on a boss fight - sometimes even less.

I'll come back to the subject now to let you all know what the difference is, if you're curious. Now, I bottom out around 1,200 tps and float as high as 2k - sometimes more on many fights - not all of them mind you, but many. What I wanted then was for someone to tell me what the difference was; was it all gear? How come I was only doing 700 tps and they were doing 1,400??

Well, now I know, so I'll tell you.

First of all; let's look at T4 content and T4 gear. Your DPS'ers aren't threat bound yet, and they are Ok with you doing 800 TPS. Aran: no aggro at all. Nightbane: your DPS has to stop constantly to avoid the charred earth. HKM: wear high stamina high avoidance gear and stand around demo shouting and shield blocking while the raid kills four other mobs. Not a TPS race. Curator: beat on the boss that takes half damage from you while your raid kills trash adds. Prince: wear enough avoidance gear to stay alive while kiting the boss through a mine field of elementals while your healers run away and your melee has to stop what its doing evey few seconds. Not a TPS race.

Gruul is maybe your first TPS race f'real yo - but even then, you're stone formed, flying around the room, and geared for the maximum possible effective health, not for threat (if you're doing it right). And besides, the raid has to stay under the second tank, not the main tank. In KZ, and in much of Gruul, you'll probably notice your TPS is highest on the trash. It will probably stay that way, too.

Since then, I've upped my hit to 5.9% - and upped my expertise so that I wipe 6.5% off the dodge and parry part of the combat table. That's almost 19% more attacks landing - yellow attacks mind you. Threat based attacks. This helps in a humongous way. Sure, expertise if a little bit of an avoidance stat - but its a huge threat stat. And, hit is good too - but it only works on miss; while expertise is doing double duty on parry and dodge. In fact, I think i feel the nerfbat coming on the expertise front I hate to say.

Also, my shield block value has gone up, thanks to pieces like the auto blocker, the S2 shield, [item]Jungle Stompers[/item], and [item]Unwavering Legguards[/item] - so when my shield slams do connect, they do more threat / damage. Also, the devastate buff helps tremendously on the initial phase of a fight building an early lead.

But perhaps almost as big as the expertise and hit rating effect on my threat has been the move to T5 content. T5 trash hits harder and gives you more rage to work with. Also, your healers are getting better and you can equip less avoidance, more hit, expertise, attack power, crit and even some armor penetration (love you [item]Vengeful Gladiator's Plate Chestpiece[/item]!)

Don't underestimate the effect of a bigger raid either; Kings, Might, Gift of the Wild, Leader of the Pack, and Windfury all added up is a massive benefit. You'll never get all of that in a 10 man raid; you're lucky to get fortitude and blood pact in a 10 man at the same time.

The next big bump has been my spec. I picked up deep wounds and impale in arms, traded off two points in cruelty and two in vitality - and never looked back. It had an immediate, dramatic impact on threat per second, plus it made PVP more fun.

At this point, on SSC trash with the exact same rotations I used three months ago, I can expect to go between 1,200 and 2,400 tps on trash mobs. If Omen hits 1,000, it's because I'm feared and cant attack at all. It's only for a brief moment; because even at 2,400 my warlocks are still threat bound! But it happens and let me tell you that mob dies fast - and my DPS'ers love me.

Now, if I could only get everyone to update to the latest Omen (again)! I do wish they'd quit tinkering with it... my raid is getting tired of me spamming them with the update whisper