MrRobot and the logic of his Prot Warr weighting system?

[Jjvalour]

He has two weighting systems for Prot Warrs--Hit/EXp (Mastery>Hit/Exp>Parry=Dodge), and Avoidance (Mastery>Parry=Dodge>Hit/Exp).
Now, here's the odd thing, his Avoidance weighting system suggests only .7% hit. and .5% expertise. The description says Avoidance is intended to take advantage of Revenge via Parry and Doge, but wouldn't Revenge miss without much higher Hit and Expertise ratings?

ETA: The hit/expertise isn't always calculated out to .7 and .5, but it's always well below 7.5% using Avoidance weightings.

[Tengenstein]

Mr. Robot is a tool, it's there to help people reforge how they want to. Unfortunatly a lot of sites haven't really done much simming. For maximum RPS, DPS and minimum DTPS and deviation of DTPS hit/exp capping just sims better assuming most of the damage is affected by CTC (if it isn't hit/exp are your only viable secondary stats).

By prioritizing avoidance You do get more Rev procs, but some of them miss so it works out moot. However less Shield Slams and Devastates connect meaning you get less rage, less SnB procs, less Ultimatum procs, and have to use TC more often to maintain weakend blows.

Prioritizing mastery>parry=dodge>hit/exp is actually petty similar except you get less Revs, more blocks for more damage, so you take slightly less damage

Prioritizing hit/exp allows for very steady rage incomes. and will alow you to bleed excess rage into Shield barrier more often which is the main reason it takes less damage, however the main advantage of this is not just the higher uptime on Sbar, but that you can put Sbars up for breath attacks and because you generate more rage will have less affect on SB uptimes.

[Aggathon]

hit/exp cap also allows for more "on demand" rage. When you've just got to have that shield slam land in order to get enough rage to put up sblock before thrash... and then you miss because you're not hit/exp capped... that's bad.

The priority should be:

hit/exp > mastery=stamina > avoidance

We say mastery = stamina because it's a pretty grey area to be honest and it depends a LOT more on boss mechanics, personal preference, and your healer's preference. Mastery is generally better against bosses that have lots of physical (see: blockable) attacks. Mastery really shines on fights like stone guard where you have two things hitting you and crit blocks and blocks in general are required to smooth out your damage intake and helps for when you can't keep sblock up and helps you generate a lot more rage. But a lot of fights are magic heavy, in which you may want to time big sbars appropriately. As sbar use increases, mastery value decreases.

So... my personal preference tends to be stam after hit/exp cap, but if there's a yellow socket or a mastery socket bonus to go for, I'll still put mastery in there to get the extra benefit. It's not quite as bad as WotLK where literally anything that wasn't stam or armor just didn't matter.

Anyways, what I'm really trying to say is that Ask MrRobot is wrong.

[Aggathon]

So I just saw another thread where someone linked their Ask MrRobot config, and I think they just list out the stat priority in their build wrong, but they actually do it right. In the hit/exp build they still hit the hit and exp caps and don't go all in on mastery, so you're probably safe using that one.

[Leucifer]

In general........... this............

Mr. Robot is a tool, it's there to help people reforge how they want to.

..... plus this........

We say mastery = stamina because it's a pretty grey area to be honest and it depends a LOT more on boss mechanics, personal preference, and your healer's preference. Mastery is generally better against bosses that have lots of physical (see: blockable) attacks. Mastery really shines on fights like stone guard where you have two things hitting you and crit blocks and blocks in general are required to smooth out your damage intake and helps for when you can't keep sblock up and helps you generate a lot more rage. But a lot of fights are magic heavy, in which you may want to time big sbars appropriately. As sbar use increases, mastery value decreases.

It's a tool. If used improperly..... you'll hurt yourself. Used properly, it can be a handy way to exert some leverage. My main thing with any of these devices used to "optimize" is to bear in mind that they are tools, and without the experience and understanding of what you're trying to accomplish with them (which is why I highlighted Agg's section), they can ultimately hinder you. Yes, it'll likely get you "in the ballpark", but if you're really looking to optimize you need to consider several factors. (again, Agg's points.... boss mechanics, personal preference/playstyle, and the healer trying to keep you up).

[Jjvalour]

Thanks for the advice guys.

So I just saw another thread where someone linked their Ask MrRobot config, and I think they just list out the stat priority in their build wrong, but they actually do it right. In the hit/exp build they still hit the hit and exp caps and don't go all in on mastery, so you're probably safe using that one.

I'm sorry, could you rephrase this? I don't understand what you're trying to say.

[sifuedition]

Really it boils down to using the correct stat weights. Askmrrobot often has at least two pre-set groups of stat weights that can be changed with the "Choose your gearing strategy" drop down in the top middle. Agg was saying that the hit/expertise build appears to be close. If you really want it optimized, especially for tanking, you should be prepared to use the "Edit Weights" to get it just right however. Those weights are all relative. The actual values don't need to be a specific number so much as they need to be in the correct proportions to each other.

For instance, if hit is twice as valuable as say dodge, then it doesn't matter if you have 3 on hit and 1.5 on dodge or 1.5 on hit and .75 on dodge. Figure out the relative importance of each stat and then fill in weights so that they reflect that relative importance. As to figuring out that weighting, however, I'm not sure there is a resource that does that for tanking well atm. You may have to wing it based on best guess relative weighting.

For instance...my impression from the theorycrafters here on prot warriors would be something like:

Hit/Expertise = 3x mastery/stam
Mastery/Stam = 2x dodge/parry (may have to be slightly higher than 2x so that a gem plus bonus doesn't sway the numbers too much)
Crit/haste = basically worthless

If that's a fairly safe ballpark, then you could use the custom weights something like...
Hit - 3
Expertise -3
Mastery - 1
Stamina - 1
Dodge - .48
Parry - .48
Crit - .1
Haste - .1

[Dreador]

I agree with all the responses in this thread but need to add that AMR gets its bad rap from the folks who use their generic stat weights, at least for this spec.

[Tengenstein]

on my 486 warrior the stat weights for DTPS are a lot closer than that (and DTPS is not the be all and end all).

Dodge -0.57
Parry -0.59
Strength -0.61
Mastery -0.75
Hit -0.80
Expertise -0.81

Note these are calculated as negatives, and this is across 25k iterations and my error bars are large enough that for me my priority is hit=exp=mastery>Str=parry=dodge and being that we know that stam can be approximated as an alternative to mastery i have a rather simple gearing strategy; More is better, get more.

[Quietsch]

@Tengen: Are those weigths from simcraft? (And if yes, what are you using as... rotation, mainly regarding sb/sbarr usage)

[sifuedition]

I find that the best in slot lists are often mis-used and that blame gets reflected poorly on AMR too. For instance, a trinket may be your best in slot but a different trinket is the best with your current gear. AMR can tell you that but you have to know how to look at the lists properly to see it. I've seen a lot of people pass on gear they should want because it isn't a part of the overall "BiS" according to AMR. Also, people not being realistic about what they can obtain.

Sinestra was a good example of that. If you just use "Find Best in Slot" it would include the Sinestra trinkets. Then, it built the rest of your gear around that. If you correctly configured AMR to not include that fight for a guild that was not likely to ever get it down, then it might have changed four or five slots based on using a different trinket.

So yeah, Dreador, I agree with you. Both the BiS feature and the reforging feature actually work well...if you use the tools properly which require an understanding of the what/why of the results you need. I use it for my dps classes now. I use Simulationcraft to get my proper stat weights and then plug them into AMR for the reforge suggestions. I find that even though hit/exp is not calculated to the exact number like wowreforge, it is usually calculated for the highest dps. If I re-sim after AMR reforges compared to re-sim after wowreforge, AMR is usually higher. Sure, it's usually less than maybe 2% difference, but hey, every little bit, you know?

Edit:
@ Teng - Is simulationcraft considered accurate for tanking? I've never assumed that it was because tanking is so hard to sim. It's not like dps where everything can be easily assumed.

[Tengenstein]

@Tengen: Are those weigths from simcraft? (And if yes, what are you using as... rotation, mainly regarding sb/sbarr usage)

@ Teng - Is simulationcraft considered accurate for tanking? I've never assumed that it was because tanking is so hard to sim. It's not like dps where everything can be easily assumed.

Somewhat. I've been harassing the simcraft guys in regard to protection warriors since 4.2, so for that spec it works rather wwell, everything is modelled correctly, its just a matter of getting the model correct. However i lack the familiarity to make it do more complex things like taunt swaps or pooling rage for a max rage Sbar for absorbing breath attacks. Simcraft is just another tool, it works fine, if you can use it fine. It's the best way of generating tanking stat weights for DTPS i have, and it still doesn't reconcile DTPS with EHP.

The priorty is a pretty basic; Keep WB up>SS>Rev>dev if ss's cd is over 1.5s>Shout>Dev whilst using zerker rage and SB at every opportunity, reacting to ultimatum procs, and if ever i go over 80 rage dump with Sbar. Which is a fair approximation of how i tank (and completely ignores the nuances of each and every specific encounter). Simulating better use of Sbar would place higher value on hit/exp, but as i generally qualify them as being your best stats and cap them regardless there is little more i can do regarding them.

[Jjvalour]

As long as we're on MrRobot, what do you guys think of his argument that sitting slightly under the hit cap is viable?
He seems more interested in DPS, so I'm not sure how well the idea applies to tanks.

[theodisius]

Teng, can you explain a bit about what is DTPS for the uninitiated like me? Does it stand for "damage taken per second"? If so, how do you calculate it - do you assume some particular pattern of incoming blows? How does it differ from TDR based calculations which you warn against in sifuedition's sig?

[Tengenstein]

Mr. Robot wants to get you the highest score (which translates into the highest DPS for damagers, damage mitigation for tanks, etc). It’s easy to agree that any hit rating over the cap is wasted. But what isn’t as obvious is that getting exactly to the hit cap isn’t always the best option.

Total Damage Reduction is not the defining characteristic a good tank, if it was every tank would a warrior/brewmaster and we'd all lol at prot pallies/druids/DKs and there silly self heals. I can understand where he's coming from when talking about DPS, but not for tanking. Tank survivability, especially for warriors is the ability to time and maximise your active mitigations, which comes down almost entirely to maximising RPS, Hit and expertise are the best stats for increasing RPS and minimising variability of rps over time. one point Mr.robot fails to adress is ease of rotation when you attacks have a chance to not connect the rotation becomes increasingly more complex. not only do you have to watch your rotation but you have to react to when it misses, for prot this isn't really very hard since we only have to worry about keeping Weakend Blows up, but if hit capped we can relaibly TC every 30s or so and keep 100% uptime, if TC can miss we need to be thinkingi need to do this every 24s, or maybe every 18s or accept that i may not have 100% uptime and take more damage becuase i couldn't debuff the boss.

The mark of a good tank is surviving, being able to take it all to the face and keep on trucking. which would you rather be the tank which doesn't take much damage but occaisionally falls down dead, just becuase the becuase the random number god farted on you, or the tank which requires some healing but never dies to rng. The Sha of Fear's thrash is a mechanic which makes this point particualrily well. Are you really going to gear so that there is a chance that sometimes you just can't get shield block up and die to thrash?

Let’s use an example to understand this better. Let’s say +Hit is your highest weighted stat with a weight of 2. Let’s say Crit has a rating of 1.8 and Mastery 1.2. The thing to focus on in this example is that Crit is much more valuable than Mastery, AND there are a finite number of combinations to get you to an exact number. On to the example: it’s possible that to get you exactly to the hit cap, you’d have to reforge all of your Crit to Hit. BUT!!! Let’s say you can get to within 20 Hit rating of the cap but you preserve all of your Crit, and instead reforge all of your mastery – since Mastery is much less valuable than Crit. Your final score would be higher.

I can totally get on board with this argument. except for prot it falls over becuase or secondary stats are so close in value losing 600 mastery to get hit capped in stead of 580 dodge to get 20 under the hit cap means you're gonna be taking 140dps more. I would quite happily take 140 dps more if i could guarnatee always having an Sbar to soften boss specials, hells my shammy healer would prolly be like "lolwut my baseline mastery means i don't even notice that. gg teng"

EDIT:

@Theodisius

it does stand for Damage Taken Per Second, Simcraft calculates it for me. it sims a Boss level NPC beating the shit out of sim-me whilst sim-me performs astandard rotation it is no different from the TDR based damage calculations warned against in Sifu's sig, thus my "and DTPS is not the be all and end all". the thing is alot of people will tell you that would not prioritise hit/exp or use Sbar exclusivesy becuase that gives better total damage reduction, which makes sense, we parry more, we have bigger blocks and we abosrb a hell of a lot more than if we we;re hit/exp capped and using SB. However over the course of my sims turns out that actually for best TDR you do want to cap hit/exp and you do want to be using SB alot.

so yeah if you don't care about TDR becuase TDR isn't really as important as making sure you never take a the hit string to face and softenong boss specials is wwhat actually stops you dying get hit/expertise capped.

and luckily it also appears that getting hit/exp capped is also best for TDR. so if thats important to you you want lots of hit/exp.

[Aggathon]

Re: not getting exactly hit capped:

I would tend to agree with Teng that it's different for a tank, because sometimes that on demand need for rage and needing your shield slam to hit, and if it lines up wrong with bad RNG and you miss and a boss executes a big move on you while you don't have sblock or sbar up and you die, then that's a problem.

There are two things that the AMR article doesn't take into account when talking about "big whoop, you missed". First is that for DPS, missing once in a fight, not a big deal. When I was a warlock I ran under hit all the time and I almost NEVER missed. And when I did sometimes I didn't even notice. The effect on your DPS of missing 1 ability in an entire boss fight is not that huge, and you can sometimes make that up with your extra crit/haste/mastery. It's a way bigger deal for a prot warrior to miss an attack though. I mean... sometimes it won't matter at all and it's whatever, but if a missed attack leads to a (improbably) death, that's a big deal, might as well just reforge that extra item and get to hit cap.

The second thing is the benefit of "other stats" for a prot warrior and for DPS. For DPS being able to get more crit/haste/mastery is huge. You will notice a slight increase in your DPS, and missing is inconsequential if it's only 1. However for warriors, the secondary stats are "meh". You won't notice that slight increase in mastery, stam, dodge, or parry. The benefit of hit/exp cap is far more than the little extra mastery or dodge you'd probably be reforging to cover the gap.

[Jjvalour]

Thanks for all the advice guys.

[Judgement]

He has two weighting systems for Prot Warrs--Hit/EXp (Mastery>Hit/Exp>Parry=Dodge), and Avoidance (Mastery>Parry=Dodge>Hit/Exp).
Now, here's the odd thing, his Avoidance weighting system suggests only .7% hit. and .5% expertise. The description says Avoidance is intended to take advantage of Revenge via Parry and Doge, but wouldn't Revenge miss without much higher Hit and Expertise ratings?

I have found that using mrrobot you need to go to the stat weights and drop stam out of the equation. then it tends to hit spot on for my build as a pally tank.
ETA: The hit/expertise isn't always calculated out to .7 and .5, but it's always well below 7.5% using Avoidance weightings.