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So, with the recent nerf to armor pen in patch 3.2.2, is it going to make stacking armor pen for Arms PvP more important (i.e. you have to stack a lot), or less important (i.e. stacking strength is better)? What are peoples opinions on the matter? And how does it change whether or not someone has access to Grim Toll?
Gonna be gemming some new pieces soon, so I'm curious to hear peoples opinions.
I switched to +Strength and Sword Spec for 3.2.2. Most of the community seems evenly split on ArPen versus Strength right now, there was a poll in the warrior forums on Arena Junkies and I think the results were pretty close to 50/50. For me, I do not have PVE ArPen gear. I have a couple pieces, but we have a lot of plate DPS and don't see much of the gear drop. I also didn't have a Grim Toll or Mjolnir's Runestone (my dice are bad). The general consensus is, you definitely should go Strength if you don't have one of those two trinkets. And even if you do have one of them, some are considering going +Str anyway.
Personally, I think the sword spec buff is incredible, and +Strength lends itself a lot better to fast target swaps in 3s where your big damage isn't dependent on a trinket proc. I like the consistancy of +Strength, as well. ArPen was universally good during a trinket proc, and otherwise always good against prot pallies & DKs running around in frost presence. However, with the rise of caster comps in S7, I'd prefer the +strength for consistant pressure on casters.
I'm glad this thread exists cause I was trying to do napkin math on the subject all day today. Here's what I'm thinking. Armor pen is still very viable if you already had a decent amount of it. I have 35% from gear and gems alone after the nerf. I do not have the runestone or grimtoll trinket yet. With battle stance I get the additional 10% passive Arp for a total of 45%. I'm currently working on getting the (2) set bonus from the pve gear that adds an additional 6% ArP. If I go strength at this point and basically switch out my pve gear for more pvp gear I can increase my resil (I have 710 currently), my HP, and my crit. If season 7 is bringing more clothy comps than Str is definently the way to go. Since the next expansion will eliminate Arp completely(at some point next year) replacing my gear with Str gems may make sense in the long run. What are other arms arena warriors doing who already have that much or more Arp?
IMHO - if you don't have grim toll/runestone gem strength. If you do consider which teams are hardest for you and if they're wearing plate. I want to try swords/str but I might wait until I get my hands on death's verdict to do it. I'm still saving arena pts for the t2 weapon (although I've only hit 2198 *sigh* hope I can hit 2200 this week)
I was at 75% armor pen all the time prior to the nerf. I was at 67% before I got my 2 piece T9. I now have 67% post nerf. Im not going to regem for STR, arp is still extremely effective at that level.
Note this is with no proc. Im using the static ARP trinket instead and Im fairly certain i hit as hard with 67% arp and 5500 AP as someone with a grim toll at 100% arp and 4500 ap.. or at least close enough for me not to run the math :)
For PvP purposes I still like my ArP. I dropped from 100% cap with GT proc to like 92% or something with it (after Bstance is factored). That is still fairly excellent and I don't have to give up bucketloads of resil to do it. There are several VERY viable ArP cap gearsets when you consider the top end relentless glad gear and 2pc T9. Blizzard would have to drop ArP back into the pits in order for me to not consider it worth getting. Being able to go toe to toe with DKs, Paladins, and resto druids (lol tree armor) is absolutely worth the bit of damage that I may or may not be doing to a clothie (which was probably overkill anyway).
IMO for pvp armor pen is still very viable over strength for arms. I spend the gold and regemmed to Str yesterday. I was doing more damage to clothies but when we faced plate wearers it was a dissaster. Before I regemmed I was already doing lots of damage to clothies anyway. I regemmed back to armor pen (cost me a fortune) and I'm doing significantly better. I still dont have grim toll or an Arp trinket and could only imagine how OP that would be. My Arp is 41% without battle stance. I would think that without an Arp trinket you need about 35% Arp from gear/gems alone to be better off than gemming for Str. If the nerf brought you below 35% switch to str.
There are high rated warriors with all strength. High rated with all ARP + trinket and all ARP with no trinket. It all works. If you have access to pvp off pieces I'd say gem for ARP. If you aren't able to get any ARP from gear you're probably better off gemming for strength.
I went with arp + axe. I dont have a grim toll or runestone. I then switched to mace and noticed I hit much harder.
IMO all targets are viable with ARP, and all weapon specs are good.