T6 Shoulders

[OnourisofRavencrest]

My guild got our first kill on Mother Shahraz last night and I'm struggling with gem decisions for my new T6 shoulders. As it stands I put a 10 Dodge, 5 Def + 7 Stam in them to get the socket bonus of 3 Dodge, my thought being that I would only really wear them for non threat sensitive encounters and would wear my T5 shoulders everywhere else. I have the T6 gloves too with a 15 stam gem and 240 armor enchant but I mostly use Gorefiend's gloves with 2% threat. My thinking on this is that I would only use T6 on really difficult fights or when threat just wasn't an issue until I get four piece set bonus.

I guess my questions are then: Am I gemming half way correct with respect to where I am now? Should I regem later for more stam when I start to use 4 pc for threat?

[Jericho]

You really can't go wrong with your current choice of gems. However, you really should be looking at your overall Effective Health. If you are like me, you will be moving from Abyssal Fury into T6 shoulders and while you will lose a decent chunk of avoidance, you will be losing a greater bit of EH by gemming for avoidance. In the end the only pieces I chose to flat out gem for avoidance were my chest and pants. This was purely because Sunwell is not a forgiving place.

Personally, I would gem 2xStamina in T6 shoulders, the +3 dodge isn't big enough to warrant trying to make the socket bonus and the loss in EH going from Abyssal Fury to T6 is sizeable not to try and make some of it up. Heading to Council and Illidan I personally believe that the EH will do you alot more good than the avoidance will.

[Murdog]

Put 2 +15 stam

Socketing Strictly for socket bonus's is just shooting yourself in the foot rarely is the bonus worth socketing anythign other then +15 (Until you running 3/6 Sunwell+).

Only time i took the socket bonus while in BT was when the Bonus was +6stam I.E. [item]Faceplate of the Impenetrable[/item] [item]Onslaught Greathelm[/item] in these 2 perticular cases i used +5Agi +7Stam beacuse over all you lose 2 Stamina and gain 5 Agilityall in all a good trade off.

My Main point is until you reach Felmyst and on you should only be socketing for Stamina unless the case i provided above is an option, anything else is just not needed.

[Rak]

I use 10 dodge and 12 defense. It depends on your gear and current progression content (Sunwell, for me).

[pompuspilot]

Heading to Council and Illidan I personally believe that the EH will do you alot more good than the avoidance will.

i disagree, ive tanked illidan and council in eh and avoidance gear and i noticed a marked decrease in damage and required healing on me when i was in avoidance gear for both encounters. for council i tank the pally in my uncrush set (high block rating) so i dont even hav to worry about using shield block and i concentrate on relecting every time i can. for illidan since he cannot crush i use all my aviodance gear with high dodge, parry etc. even with 35% dodge and 24% parry i still hav alot of rage so threat is not an issue, i guarantee your healers will notice the difference versus eh gear. to be honest i would tank every encounter in high avoidance if it were not for the fact that threat is an issue on most fights with less damage dealing bosses...so i use high threat gear for most bosses in bt and mh

[Armstrong]

for council i tank the pally in my uncrush set (high block rating) so i dont even hav to worry about using shield block

Gathios the Shatterer cannot crush, fyi.

I agree though that as long as you can hit 20-21k hp buffed, extra avoidance becomes noticeably more beneficial for the last few bosses of MH and BT. I've gemmed my T6 shoulders the same as the OP and continue to use my T5 for threat.

[bosephus]

I've been dwelling on how to enchant these also, coming from using the Pauldrons of Abyssal Fury. Here's my thinking aloud, calculating avoidance as 18.9 Dodge Rating = 1% Dodge, 23.65 Parry Rating = 1% Parry, and 19.7 Defense Rating = .33% Dodge + .33% Parry + .33% Miss = 1% Avoidance.

Pauldrons of Abyssal Fury: 72 Stamina, 28 Def, 36 Dodge (3.32% avoidance).

Option 1: x2 +15 Stamina gems. Results in 83 Sta, 25 Def, 31 Parry (2.58% avoidance). This provides a whopping 83 stamina, however compared to Abyssal Fury, that's only an increase of 11 stamina (110 HP) and a drop of .74% avoidance.

Option 2: +10 Dodge, +10 Defense. Results in 53 Stamina, 35 Def, 31 Par, 13 Dodge (3.76% avoidance). Compared to Abyssal Fury, that's a drop of 19 Stamina (190 HP), but a gain of .44% avoidance.

Option 3: +10 Dodge, +5Def/+7Sta. Results in 60 Stamina, 32 Def, 31 Par, 3 Dodge (3.09% avoidance). Compared to Abyssal Fury, it's a drop of 12 Stamina (120 HP), and a loss of .23% avoidance as well. I think this is the worst gem combination.

Option 4: +5Dodge/+7Sta, +5Def/+7Sta. Results in 67 Stamina, 30 Def, 31 Par, 8 Dodge (3.25% avoidance). Compared to Abyssal Fury, drop of 5 Stam, .07% Avoidance. Also a downgrade from Abyssal Fury.

Option 5: +15 Stamina, +10 Dodge (missing the socket bonus). Results in 68 Stamina, 25 Def, 31 Par, 10 Dodge (3.11% Avoidance). Still a downgrade.

It seems the best choices are x2 +15 Stamina or the +10Dodge/+10Defense gems. Using the split gems results in a downgrade from the Pauldrons of Abyssal Fury.

I'm having trouble deciding which of the options to go with, however. I don't think the +15Sta x2 is really the best choice here. 110HP gain versus .74% avoidance lost sounds like a lot to me. Converting that into gems, that's trading less then a Solid Star of Elune for a Subtle Crimson Spinel + half a Subtle Living Ruby.

I'll prob keep the Abyssal Fury for use as an avoidance piece and the T6 as a just Stamina, but I just feel like I'm losing value by not gemming them for avoidance. Lucky me, we've got a ton of epic gems sitting in the guild bank saved for use with T6 gear, so I think I can mess around with them if I wanted to.

Edit: Somebody also suggested throwing a yellow +10 Hit gem in there. That could be fun, and would change the balance a bit.

[ebs2002]

The socket bonus of +3dodge does not warrant gemming for the bonus in and of itself, so you should look at the T6 stats itself.

It has higher armor than Abyssal Fury, and the possibility for more stamina than the Abyssal Fury with 15sta gems, so you should treat the abyssal as your avoidance piece and 15sta the T6 shoulders up for EH.

The only exception to this rule, IMO, is if you have to wear the shoulders for your 2pc or 4pc set bonus. The only reason you'd really care about the 2pc set bonus is if you need more EH, so 15sta still applies. The only reason you'd really care about the 4pc set bonus is if you need more threat, in which case a pair of 10hit gems for even more threat may be suitable (if you're otherwise going to stick with Abyssal Fury for your normal set. Personally for me, EH and threat go hand in hand, so I'd still go +15sta).

In all other cases, though, I'd recommend sta gemming (if you have the Abyssal Fury already).


If you are comparing this versus the T5 shoulders like the OP was, it depends on when you'd wear each piece. I'd still go +15sta, since the socket bonus is pretty lackluster and the avoidance is better than T5's avoidance; in other words, the only time you'd ever want to wear T5 is if you need the 2pc T5 and/or you need more threat; for all other fights, T6 is just better, and 15sta outshines any other gemming choice.

[bosephus]

The armor difference between the Onslaught Shoulderguards and the Pauldrons of Abyssal Fury is 45. It's my understanding from Satrina's old post that 1 Stamina = 20 Armor, so the difference is worth 2 stamina points. So that makes the total EH lead of T6 gemmed for stamina over Abyssal Fury the equivalent of 130HP, at the loss of .74% avoidance.

Compared to gemming for +10Dodge/+10Defense, which is -170HP/+.44% avoidance. Again, I'll probably start with x2 +15 Sta gems, but it just doesn't seem like I'm getting the full value out of them.

[veneretio]

If you're going for the socket bonus, use 10 Dodge gems for Red slots. Agility/Stamina is a wasted gem imo.

That being said I'd use 2x 15 Stamina for these shoulders. If you must go for socket bonus... Rak is right with Defense and Dodge gems.

[ebs2002]

When you need avoidance, you use the Abyssal Fury. When you need EH, you use the T6 shoulders with +15sta. You'll get the most EH possible with that setting, and you'll be wearing it when you need it most.

You should be gemming an item to its strengths, based on what else you have available. You have a solid avoidance piece with Abyssal Fury, you don't have a solid EH piece with it. I still stand by the 15sta gem opinion