[Satrina]

** Edit 22 October because I forgot to divide by 1.10 at the end **

So I went to the PTR to test the new Devastate as patched in on 19 October.

Assumptions

This is the wording of the Devastate tool tip on the PTR...

Sunder the target's armor causing the Sunder Armor effect. In addition, causes 50% of weapon damage plus 35 for each application of Sunder Armor on the target. The Sunder Armor effect can stack up to 5 times.

Applying Devastate gives this in the combat log...

Your Devastate hits Servant of Razelikh for 44 Servant of Razelikh is afflicted by Sunder Armor

Assumption 1: Based on the ability description and combat log output, I assume that triggering Devastate causes Sunder Armour to be invoked as if you pressed a key to do so, and that they have not made code changes to try and combine the two effects in some way. (Being a lazy programmer, that's exactly how I'd do it =)

Assumption 2: The innate threat modifier of Devastate has remained a static, additive number. That is, they have not gone and changed it to a multiplier on us.

(It also looks very much like the Sunder effect takes place after the Devastate effect, so the damage mitigation on your third Devastate will be against two Sunders)

Methodology
- Me, 70 warrior with Defiance and Devastate. All threat generated in Defensive Stance.
- I recruited my roommate to come with his mage, giving me a partner with no innate threat modifiers
- Target: Our old friend Servant of Razelikh in the Blasted Lands as target dummy.
- We both used shiny new http://thottbot.com/i851 to keep error margins small. However, when testing multiple Sunders + Devastate, he used his http://thottbot.com/i28802 to whittle down the majority of the threat I created with the Sunders, then switched to the Cutlass well in advance of the expected aggro transfer.
- I took my shield off to ensure that Shield Specialisation procs would not inject extra threat for the rage gain should I block.

I wrote a little addon to read the combat log and pick out when I hit, when I Devastate, and when I Sunder my target and stores each hit as a threat number unmodified by anything (straight damage numbers as they appear in the combat log; 301 for a Sunder) in a list. It also reads the hits made by my party members and stores them in a separate list. Once the addon detects that my target's target is no longer me, it stops recording data. It then performs the calculation taking modifiers into account and displays the difference in threat as a quick sanity check. All calculations below are done in a spreadsheet based on the recorded damage numbers for verification. The data points themselves are in this thread.

Standing out of aggro range, I performed Bloodrage. Once Bloodrage finished, I walked to the mob and took social aggro. At this point, some combination of Devastate and Sunder Armour was performed. I then ensured that attack was off, and turned my back on the mob. Mage proceeded to autoattack the mob until it turned to him, at which case we ran off and leashed it. As noted above the addon stops data collection the instant my target's target changes, so no extra hits should be collected.

Some tests have autoattack hits in the data points. Since we are not testing for a threat multiplier, the extra threat from autoattacks will fall out in the wash (i.e. some number of the Mage's attacks go to overcoming the autoattack threat) and does not affect the calculated result for Devastate threat.




Numbers!
We expect a significant difference between the calculated amount of threat which does not assume any value for the innate threat of Devastate, and the amount of damage needed by the Mage to draw aggro. We sum all of the Mage's hits except the last one. At this point, we know that the next hit is the one that drew aggro, and so the amount of threat needed to draw aggro was between 1 and the size of the last hit. Using this, we determine a minimum threat and maximum threat for drawing aggro for each data collection. The difference between these threat numbers and the calculated amount of threat should give us the range of the innate threat for Devastate.

One Devastate
Warrior => 346 => 569 with defensive stance, defiance, 110% threat
Mage => 755 to second last hit. Last hit was 10.
Minimum low = 756, delta = 114 ((756 - 569)/1.495/1.10 = 114)
Minimum high = 765, delta = 119 ((765 - 569)/1.495/1.10 = 119)

(This set includes one autoattack for 85 damage)
Warrior => 468 => 770 with defensive stance, defiance, 110% threat
Mage => 961 to second last hit. Last hit was 10
Minimum low = 962, delta = 117
Minimum high = 971, delta = 122

Warrior => 345 => 567 with defensive stance, defiance, 110% threat
Mage => 752 to second last hit. Last hit was 14
Minimum low = 753, delta = 113
Minimum high = 766, delta = 121

Warrior => 344 => 566 with defensive stance, defiance, 110% threat
Mage => 754 to second last hit. Last hit was 17
Minimum low = 755, delta = 115
Minimum high = 771, delta = 125

Range = (115-119)

One Sunder then one Devastate
(This set includes one autoattack for 90 damage)
Warrior => 792 => 1302 with defensive stance, defiance, 110% threat
Mage => 1522 to second last hit. Last hit was 14
Minimum low = 1523, delta = 134
Minimum high = 1536, delta = 142

Range = (135-142)

Two Sunders then one Devastate
(This set includes one autoattack for 90 damage)
Threat done = 1126 => 1852 with defensive stance, defiance, 110% threat
Damage done = 2100 to second last hit
Minimum low = 2101, delta = 152
Minimum high = 2112, delta = 158

Range = (152-158)

Three Sunders then one Devastate
Here the Servant failed us and got to 1% health before the Mage drew aggro. He goes kinda funny for a while at 1% so we just leashed it and left it at that. I'll probably find something with more health to test these cases later.



Results
The important result is that we do appear to get the threat of Sunder and Devastate both. To my thinking, it appears to come from the fact that triggering Devastate also invokes Sunder Armour as if you had done so with a separate keystroke, as assumed above. I'm sure the debate regarding overpowered will rage on, and it may well be scaled back before 2.3 goes live. We shall see.

Another interpretation is that Devastate simply applies the Sunder debuff, and its innate threat has been changed to the 402.

A very interesting thing is the observed amount innate threat of Devastate. Given the triggered Sunder assumption, it appears to have been increased from 101 to (115-119) for zero Sunders, and at first glance (using only one data point for each test) increases by approximately 20 per Sunder already stacked (more results are needed to get a correct value). Perhaps the values are 115/135/155/etc. This could be an error in my calculation or an error in data collection. It could also be an actual change, intentional or not. As before, this could be explained by changing the innate threat of Devastate to 415/435/455/etc. and having Devastate simply apply the effect of Sunder Armour on the target. Ideally, someone else's independent testing will confirm or refute this result one way or the other. A wider array of data points will certainly be needed to be certain and to get an accurate number.

I stand by my initial assumption on the mechanics, given the feedback from the game in the talent description and combat log.

The actual number of Devastate's innate threat will be, of course, needed for updating threat meter addons. However, I think these results should satisfy that the threat generated by a Devastate has been increased, and actually conforms to the statement "the threat of Sunder and Devastate".

[Link]

This is the kind of boost mediocre warriors need to compete with equally geared paladin threat generation.

How does the new Devastate compare to Revenge in TPS/TPR?

[Ilya M]

Hey satrina, any way that we could do a test in regards to the 5 stack? if devastate is invoking sunder will it continue to do so after th 5 stack?

[Kazeyonoma]

interesting findings, i was wondering what the latest ptr patch was for, nothing noted a change to devastate, but didn't have tester to try it out, i'll try to conduct something when i get a chance, and I'm sure Fame is up to helping test as well.

[Tiarnach]

Well, lessee, if you follow the trend on the devastate innate threats, then you'll have 230 innate at 5 sunders for a total of 531 threat of 50% of your weapon damage + 175. With a mallet in my standard gear, this is about 250-260 without much in the way of AP buffs. So all things rolled together you're looking at about 780 base threat per use before modifiers. This divided by 9 gives you ~87 threat per rage. And a straight spam of devastate would give you 520 TPS pre modifier and about 774 TPS post modifier. I'll let someone else match it up with the other ability rankings, but it looks absolutely outstanding.

[Bitesize]

Considering balance issues, it seems likely to me that once 5 Sunders are stacked, Devastate will just refresh them without applying the additional 301 threat. Including the extra Sunder threat while stacking them easily guarantees that Devastate is better than Sunder in every way while also improving warrior threat early on a bit.

Continuing to add an additional 301 threat to every Devastate for an entire fight, though, would probably be a rather imbalancing increase to warrior TPS. It does seem that they decided the ability could use a threat improvement over the course of a long fight, though, and that would be where the 230 base threat Devastates at 5 Sunders would come in.

At any rate I think regardless of the specifics, they are indeed going to make this Devastate change a nice one that will remove the tedium of switching between Sunder and Devastate.

[Ciderhelm]

Satrina,

I'm tempted to say this fix also fixed a months-old issue with Devastate. Remember the original tooltip?

I'm sure Kaz or someone will be testing this soon, am curious what happens at 5 Sunder Armors.

[Ciderhelm]

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/th...12084203&sid=1

[Kazeyonoma]

here's some more data to bolster satrina's findings.

EDIT: Using Jarhead's better read formula:
Threat.required.to.pull / 1.10 = threat.generated.by.warrior / 1.495 = threat.before.multipliers - any.damage = innate.threat

I used a holy priest (Thanks Atuki!), hitting for only 4-5 damage a piece using blacksmithing hammer against the servants of Allistarj.

first test, consisted of NOTHING but 4-5 damage hits, lets just say there's over 170 data points collected:

Result:
I hit with an 87 Devastate Crit, followed by a 88 white hit (using a Main Gauche).

His total damage came out to be 953 damage with the last hit being a 9 dmg crit.

953 / 1.10 = 866.36 / 1.495 = 579.51 - 87 - 88 = 404.51 innate threat from using new Devastate. +/-8 since the last hit was 9.

Now my other test:

188 white crit and 45 devastate.

he dealt a total of 1013 damage with last hit being a 5 damage hit.

1013 / 1.10 = 920.91 / 1.495 = 615.99 - 188 - 45 = 382.99 innate threat from using new Devastate. +/-4.

Findings are similar to Satrina, either exactly 402 (see first test) or somewhere close to it (finding #2). Another thing I agree with is that sunders happen after devastate damage, and it shows two casts happening (you devastate, you cast sunder armor).

I didn't do further testing between multiple uses, so its possible what Satrina mentions towards scaling devastate threat is true, no word from me yet on this. Hopefully I can do it tonight.

[Kazeyonoma]

Source: Ciderhelm Satrina, I'm tempted to say this fix also fixed a months-old issue with Devastate. Remember the original tooltip? I'm sure Kaz or someone will be testing this soon, am curious what happens at 5 Sunder Armors.

What exactly would the test procedure be for this? Devastate to 5 sunders, then Record Threat again?

[Ciderhelm]

or if you wanted to be rock solid on Threat while we're shaky on exactly the Devastate Threat, you could just Sunder Armor to 5 then use Devastate.

[mcguffin]

Graphically speaking, sunder debuff seems to be applied even after the 5 sunders. We always get the big red circle from devastate *and* the blue splash from sunder

[phaze]

Nice work, Satrina!

A question for you, or someone else on the PTR:
Have you attempted to measure the threat of Devastate while in Battle or Berserker Stance?

The combined sunder effect is very welcome for all situations. The additional threat is great for when we want it or don't care (tanking or solo'ing).

My concern is for when we don't want the threat (group/raid situations where you aren't the MT, and wish to contribute DPS).

[Bitesize]

Source: Ciderhelm I'm tempted to say this fix also fixed a months-old issue with Devastate. Remember the original tooltip?

It would be really interesting if this change did make the innate threat scale per Sunder like the tooltip seemed to indicate before... considering it apparently has a new tooltip that no longer reads that way. Heh.

Edit: Something I just thought of. Having Devastate use a seperate Sunder effect does a lot of things. For one, if you were to hit a target that were for some reason immune to damage at the time of the hit but vulnerable to Sunder Armor, it would still be hit with the Sunder Armor and get Sunder's threat. So you don't have to worry about such a situation where you'd need to be ready to switch to Sunder. Also, it'll make Devastate automatically upgrade to a new rank of Sunder when you get it, I imagine.

[thugthedum]

Source: Kazeyonoma What exactly would the test procedure be for this? Devastate to 5 sunders, then Record Threat again?

I'm a little lost on what exactly you're asking, but would having another warrior apply the sunders help somehow?

[Satrina]

Regarding Sunders after 5 (as I posted on the WoW forums):

When I cast Sunder on the live server (no Sunder), I get a gold glow animation around my hands. When you cast Sunder with a keystroke, you get the blue aura flash around your target, no matter how many Sunders are currently stacked on it. When you Sunder on the PTR, you get both of the above effects no matter how many times you've Sundered and/or Devastated the mob. It will be good to get some numbers to back it up, but I would think that the Sunders keep getting applied and will bet we continue to see the combined threat.


Regarding Battle/Berserk:
I haven't tested it, no.


Regarding Kazey's numbers:
I'm a little boggled by the differences. WHen I run your numbers the way I did mine, I get innate threat value range of 70-90.


I'm not sure why people are calling overpowered, to be honest. If I'm right in my assumption, Devastate has been changed to an attack that invokes an existing ability for free - two attacks for one GCD. Now think about that. If you wanted to increase a warrior's threat output:

- Without changing something to a scaling model (let's just ignore the debate on scaling threat)
- Knowing that the GCD is the speed limiter for threat generation
- Without introducing yet another button to press (and indeed removing one)
Then this model is pretty much the direction you would have to take.

Edit: Bitesize makes good points. There are good programmatic reasons to just make Devastate simply invoke Sunder. They can reduce the complexity of the Devastate coding. They now have (or maybe always had) the code to say "if user invokes A with a keypress, then invoke B as well"

[mcguffin]

Source: Satrina - Without changing something to a scaling model (let's just ignore the debate on scaling threat) - Knowing that the GCD is the speed limiter for threat generation - Without introducing yet another button to press (and indeed removing one) Then this model is pretty much the direction you would have to take.

you are right. But, are we knowing if Blizzard wants to buff warrior threat ability?

[Bitesize]

Hmm, if Devastate continues to get the 301 Sunder threat for the whole fight and if it additionally has gone from 101 base threat to 130 + (20 * Sunders) = 230 base threat on its own, then it gains (301 + 230 - 101) = 430 threat per use. After Defensive Stance and Defiance, 642 threat. Assuming it's used twice per 6 seconds:

642 * 2 = 1284
1284 / 6 = 214

214 additional TPS from the change. Of course, in a real situation you wouldn't be able to maximize that due to other considerations, but still it seems incredibly high to me.

Revenge: Assuming ~20% damage reduction from armor for Revenge, it should average ~368 damage, plus 200 innate. 568 * 1.495 = 849 threat.

Assuming Devastate will hit for 200 damage (easy, obviously), its threat would be (200 + 301 + 230) = 731 * 1.495 = 1092 threat. In a situation where the 7 rage difference between them isn't a huge deal, you get 243 more threat at the least by using Devastate, or another 40 TPS by replacing Revenge in your rotation completely, bringing the TPS difference up to 254+.

Does this really not seem a bit much?

[Satrina]

I would not bet the farm on 130/150/etc. innate threat for devastate until it has been corroborated by someone else's data. Kazey's data doesn't show the same innate.

[Bitesize]

Adjusting to assume Devastate's own base threat is still 101, no scaling on it.

301 * 1.495 = 450 additional threat per use.
450 * 2 = 900
900 / 6 = 150 TPS increase

A 200 damage Devastate would be 900 threat total, beating Revenge by ~50 threat and increasing TPS by ~8 if replaced in the rotation. This probably wouldn't be worth it since the rage difference is almost a whole extra improved HS, so I'm not really going to consider it.

Overall those numbers seem more reasonable to me.