Dual-Wield Warrior (No Titan's Grip)

[Satorri]

Interesting, why at 60?

[Loganisis]

Why would I want to dual-wield two weapons that each have a 3.40 attack speed when the numbers below ring true:

v. Level 80 mob: 5.0% / dual-wield: 24%
v. Level 81 mob: 5.5% / dual-wield: 24.5%
v. Level 82 mob: 6.0% / dual-wield: 25% (level of most heroic bosses)
v. Level 83 mob: 8.0% / dual-wield: 27% (level of raid bosses)

It's preposterous. If you have a 27% miss chance why in the nine hells would you want to put the slowest weapon in the game in BOTH HANDS?!

Sometimes I think I know more than I do, but it seems to me that the frustration over these "preposterous" miss numbers is wildly misplaced.

3/3 Precision, 164 hit and your yellow attacks will never miss (dodge/parry is another discussion).

So what exactly is impacted by the chart above? Your OH whites almost exclusively (because your MH whites have been replaced by Heroic Strike). So you're looking at a ~19% chance to miss with your off-hand whites.

Considering the much larger top-end damage on your MH, which factors into your yellow attacks very signficantly, off-hand white damage is dwarfed (would Deep woulds be a bigger factor?). Factor in larger crits off MH Yellows and the gap between 1-hand and 2-hand TG damage would increase even more.

Miss #s aren't a big issue in a fury rotation as long as you're yellow capped. Adequate Exp and placement behind raid bosses (and lets face it, thats the only DPS anyone REALLY cares about) and you're a DPS machine.

[Imriela]

Interesting, why at 60?

This is why

[Satorri]

Ha ha, I had a feeling it was something like that, but I didn't think there were many bastions of Vanilla purist love left. =)

[Solasun]

On a related but non-congruous point, I am excited by the fact that they have mentioned trying to make Fury a Titan's Grip *or* one-hand dual wield tree.

If they can make Dual Wield Fury as fun as they managed to make Dual Wield Frost in 3.3 - I'll pick up a PVE DPS spec again. As to the actual topic - sadly I doubt you're going to out-damage or even match TG specs as much as some of us would like you to.

[Satorri]

It's faulty logic to go into a development cycle saying, "I know they're saying they'll give us the option, but I'm sure it will be weaker and unappealing."

In all likelihood if they can't find a way to balance it, they'll just drop support for it. The more likely thing to happen is that they'll balance it, but find they have to adjust it down the road as gear improves to keep them balanced with heavier weapons.

[Loganisis]

It's faulty logic to go into a development cycle saying, "I know they're saying they'll give us the option, but I'm sure it will be weaker and unappealing."

In all likelihood if they can't find a way to balance it, they'll just drop support for it. The more likely thing to happen is that they'll balance it, but find they have to adjust it down the road as gear improves to keep them balanced with heavier weapons.

It would be interesting to see them try to manage it. Yellow damage mechanics would almost have to be a function of Speed * Top End Damage instead of just top end damage to keep DPS output similar between 1H and 2H. I wonder if you'll start seeing class-only weapons? Such as 1-hand swords only warriors and DW DKs can use in order to balance out the stats on them? Be interesting to see if those 1-handers would be interesting to rogues as well? Buffed up dual 1handers for a dual1hander class...

Or is the impression that TG will give a bonus to 1-Handers? A lot will depend if they make 2 talent paths in the tree (1H dual and 2H dual) or modify TG to allow both play styles.

[Martie]

It would be interesting to see them try to manage it. Yellow damage mechanics would almost have to be a function of Speed * Top End Damage instead of just top end damage to keep DPS output similar between 1H and 2H. I wonder if you'll start seeing class-only weapons? Such as 1-hand swords only warriors and DW DKs can use in order to balance out the stats on them? Be interesting to see if those 1-handers would be interesting to rogues as well? Buffed up dual 1handers for a dual1hander class...

Or is the impression that TG will give a bonus to 1-Handers? A lot will depend if they make 2 talent paths in the tree (1H dual and 2H dual) or modify TG to allow both play styles.

I think the re-occurrance of 1handers with strength will go a long way to make a difference. Add some procs that favor fast weapons, and you can get a decent way into balancing it.
I think that this is one of the reasons that they are introducing reforging, by the way - instead of making two similar weapons, where the main difference is 120 str or 120 agility, they can make one weapon with 80 strength and agility. Reforging allows people to change the unwanted stat into the other.

[Loganisis]

I think that this is one of the reasons that they are introducing reforging, by the way - instead of making two similar weapons, where the main difference is 120 str or 120 agility, they can make one weapon with 80 strength and agility. Reforging allows people to change the unwanted stat into the other.

Hmm... Maybe I'm wrong, but the last blue post I saw for Reforging mentioned a 50% penalty for switching, so if a sword had 120 agility you could make it 60 Str, or 60 agility and 30 Str.

I don't see reforging as being utilized very much, at least not in more than a stop-gap manner. The penalty to reforging is just too high. So if you've been unlucky with RNG, you'll use it to replace a stat like Hit with something else because you have too much of it, but the trade off equivalency means the stat you are switching too, if it's not a over-minimum capped stat (e.g. 164 hit with 3/3 precision for Fury and hit), it's going to require a 2:1 equivelency advantage for swapping. Which means that, at least where WotLK is invovled, no would would swap 2 Agi for 1 Str.

Over minimum Hit, over soft-capped exp, over capped ArP, they'll be value to switching stats around, but the big issue this round, at least when it came to BiS gear for Fury is the 2 or 3 or 4 slots that the agility gear was preferred (agi frost vendor belt over str belt, agi ashen ring, etc). Maybe I'm being too pessemsitic, but if the mechnics don't change much, swapping 2 agility for 1 strength would be a net DPS loss.

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Changing the proc rate for fury talents wouldn't seem to be much of a solution since most attacks are yellow attacks, leaving few white attacks to make a difference, even with a faster wep speed (especially when using talent like HS to swap white for yellow).

AP based yellows would seem to be okay by increasing the STR on 1-handers (since AP is being removed from gear). It's the top-end damage that I think would have to become a (Wep speed * Damage)*/+ X formula rather than the current Damage */+ X. That would seem to equalize 1Handers and 2Handers.

[Martie]

Hmm... Maybe I'm wrong, but the last blue post I saw for Reforging mentioned a 50% penalty for switching, so if a sword had 120 agility you could make it 60 Str, or 60 agility and 30 Str.

My point exactly. Right now, virtually all 1hander dps weapons have agility/stam as their stats, which is one of the reasons that they are suboptimal for plate wearers - no strength.
So if they change it that you can basically choose between agi or str through reforging, (instead of ging 120 of one stat, they'd give 80 of each - reforge the unwanted stat into the wanted stat, and you get 120 of the prime stat,) making 1handed weapons more appealing for us plate wearers.

[Loganisis]

So if they change it that you can basically choose between agi or str through reforging, (instead of ging 120 of one stat, they'd give 80 of each - reforge the unwanted stat into the wanted stat, and you get 120 of the prime stat,) making 1handed weapons more appealing for us plate wearers.

Hmm... I doubt that'd work unless they really redo preffered stats for classes. Right now a sword, all else being equal would have a higher expected DPS at 80 Str 80 agi than 120 Str. Each point of agility is >50% the value of each point of strength (more like 77% IIRC from Landsoul's).

I know it's all up in the air right now - but this sorta proves the point on Reforging - unless you're over min/cap, swapping a stat to another is probably going to be a DPS loss.

Reforging will be useful in some cases (off-spec limited drops with a bad collection of stats on them, like when I was running with 600 hit in my Fury offspec because of the gear...) but in most cases, it's going to be a net loss to reforge for Fury.

[Katzazi]

Agility will not be a good stat for plate wearers in Cata. I doubt that it will be worth >50% then...

[Destruyen]

Agility will not be a good stat for plate wearers in Cata. I doubt that it will be worth >50% then...

agi isn't that good of a stat now for dps warriors. however, since agi gear has a 5th stat on it while str items only has 4 usually makes those items better than str options.

[Satorri]

Agility will not be a good stat for plate wearers in Cata. I doubt that it will be worth >50% then...

That isn't necessarily true. It will not give AP, but it will still give crit. It is safe to say it will surely not compare to Str, but it is presumptive to assume it will not be good anyway. We'll have to see just how it all shakes down.

Just understand that they will not try to open up the ability for 1-handed Fury and then not support it. They have good reason to support it, since it will share weapons with Frost DKs.

[Loganisis]

Yeah. According to Landsoul's spreadsheet, 1 Str = .7769 Agi in terms of DPS effectiveness. So any trade-off above 1.5538 Agility to 1 Strength would be a net DPS loss, and since the stated trade off is 2:1, it would be a DPS trade loss off to trade 2 agility for 1 str.

Of course this is all based on the current mechanics. I know they're reworking the way many stats are working.

[Trogdorrior]

Maybe i'm adding something that has already been said but for me, at least, pvp is as much about utility as it is about damage. I really don't see what utility a fury spec, esepcially a tiny little 1h fury spec would bring to the pvp table. Aside from nominal self heals from bloodthirst and blood craze and the slow from piercing howl, the tree is all about pounding on something really hard and not much else. That very same fact is what makes 2h fury ideal for pve. There is little to no fluff in there. Given that the stats on two 1h weapons are typically less, when added together, than one 2h of the same ilevel, carrying two of those weapons makes for a huge stat buff, and stats are king.
Secondly, Maybe I'm playing my spec wrong, but I see alot more yellow than I do white when I'm whacking at mobs.

[Imriela]

Maybe i'm adding something that has already been said but for me, at least, pvp is as much about utility as it is about damage. I really don't see what utility a fury spec, esepcially a tiny little 1h fury spec would bring to the pvp table. Aside from nominal self heals from bloodthirst and blood craze and the slow from piercing howl, the tree is all about pounding on something really hard and not much else. That very same fact is what makes 2h fury ideal for pve. There is little to no fluff in there. Given that the stats on two 1h weapons are typically less, when added together, than one 2h of the same ilevel, carrying two of those weapons makes for a huge stat buff, and stats are king.
Secondly, Maybe I'm playing my spec wrong, but I see alot more yellow than I do white when I'm whacking at mobs.

I'm going to guess you didn't play in Vanilla or TBC, because I remember some Fury warriors in PvP that would kill anything and anybody they came across; more so in Vanilla than TBC, but yeah. With the rework of the Fury tree and how it works, I would agree that Fury is the weakest PvP spec currently.

[Edgewalker]

I'm going to guess you didn't play in Vanilla or TBC, because I remember some Fury warriors in PvP that would kill anything and anybody they came across; more so in Vanilla than TBC, but yeah. With the rework of the Fury tree and how it works, I would agree that Fury is the weakest PvP spec currently.

Mortal Strike warriors were always infinitely better than fury warriors in vanilla... the healing debuff had nothing to do with it.
Sweeping Strikes - Whirlwind was the greatest group PvP tool, Windfury worked much better with 2 handed weapons, and stacked with Sword Spec. and Hand of Justice.
Fury did good damage in top end gear, and you could still get easy kills with it, but it had nothing on MS specs.

[Sliverspark]

Honestly, I think when Cataclysm comes out, no one is going to know what to do and what is effective for a while. Just in speculation and opinion: it's going to be a competely different game almost. And I'm hoping Blizzard is putting things together so that there are either tons of cookie-cutter specs, or none whatsoever. I think that's why so many changes are being implemented. Personally, I like dual-wielding two 1-handers, but I can't do that because everyone knows that Fury is the best DPS PvE spec.

[Satorri]

Honestly, I think when Cataclysm comes out, no one is going to know what to do and what is effective for a while. Just in speculation and opinion: it's going to be a competely different game almost.

That's a pretty safe assumption. They take the opportunity to make major paradigm changes with every expansion and level cap bump, and when they rebalance all the abilities for the new talents and methodologies they usually come out differently, so it takes time for people to re-explore. That's part of the fun and excitement of an expansion for people like the ones who frequent this section of this forum.