Confused by expertise

[Ady]

As an arms dps warr should I be gemming strength, expertise, or arp. My hit is capped, should I aim to gem exp, most of the forums seem to say so, but when I look at the armory of a guy I know to give great dps his exp is 8. I am thoroughly baffled, and it is an expensive job to keep swapping round. My armory is in prot gear atm, and doesn't seem to update often so not much point linking.

Thanks.

[SimplyBlue]

From the sticky in the WoW forums-

Stat Priority as Arms:

1. Hit Rating up to 264
2. Crit up to 35% in battle stance
3. Balance of STR/Crit and work on Expertise capping

Assuming you are hit capped, because if you're not, you should gem for +hit until you are [Rigid, Yellow gems give straight +hit]. Otherwise, use the following mentality.

If a socketted piece of gear does not have a significant set bonus, socket all +crit yellow gems in that item. If you want the socket bonus, or find that you would benefit more from hybrid gemming it, then go for the socket bonus. All "prismatic" sockets, or generic sockets should be gemmed with +Crit also.

[VikingKong]

AP/ArP comes before Crit rating. In fact, Expertise comes before crit rating.

If you lack high attack power/armor reduction, you will hit like a wet noodle.

Expertise increases dps because, while you can use Overpower if an enemy dodges, it is a dps decrease if they do.

There are two schools of thought on the AP/ArP vs. Expertise debate, but all of them agree that Crit comes after both of those stats.

[Ady]

Thanks for the answers,I presently have 22 exp, but this means most of my gem slots have exp gems in. Should I swap them for strength, or up my crit, I got about 2100 dps on a test dummy with them last night.

[mabijaoude]

Expertise soft cap is 26 without talents.

with weapon mastery in the arms tree you only need 18 expertise.

if you are lucky to have a racial like dwarfs / orc / human (I think). you would need (based on the correct weapon, 13 , 15 , 15 respectively expertise.

Once you are hit capped, expertise soft cap it relatively easy since you don't need the full 26.

after that honestly, I have stacked straight ArP and it has worked out very well. it is cheap to gem (rating -> skill conversion) and if you are a dwarf (like I) with a mace racial that gives us 5 expertise skill, if you roll mace specialization you get 15% ignore armor.

15% + 10 % (from battle stance), and then you can easily get 20-30 % ArP on gear. If you are lucky enough to get Grim toll (which I am not as of yet). you will (supposedly) see huge boost in dps when it procs.

also throw on a shattering throw on a boss when heroism is popped and let the good times roll.