SCF? please

[TerjynPovar]

I know you got it Tastian.

I wasn't saying Feral Swipe is good, I was saying that SCF3 is that bad unless you are an extremely uber beastlord...as Feral Swipe is the bottom of the barrel for Beastlord AAs and yet SCF3 compares to it.

[Murkk Dakruul]

I wouldn't say it's bottom of the barrel though. Most people run two nukes and even without focus or the GoD nuke SCF3 will give them 2.6 extra DPS, not including proc crits.

[Argach]

If I had Feral Swipe, it'd be 0 dps for me since I can't be bothered to push yet another button for ~1.5 dps. I don't even kick. SCF on the other hand is passive and generates over 4 dps for me. Of course, I do wield ED, but even if I was still un-uber I'd still chain 675 and 450 nukes which would give a theoretical 2.6 dps as Murkk said, most likely nearer 2 dps + proc crits in real use, which would put it at the same effeciency without the added bother as Feral Swipe.

[TerjynPovar]

Where the hell do you guys get the mana to run two nukes?

With a Fero cycle and slowing I barely have the mana to run one, with Flowing Thought 7 and Mental Clarity 2.

If I don't have anything other than Dominion, I don't even have the mana to run ONE nuke consistently, I have to space them out or run out of mana entirely.

And, I might add, that's 2.6 DPS if you discount all resists.  Cold spells are fairly commonly resisted everywhere...well, everywhere I fight anyway.

*EDIT* Actually, where's the 2.6 come from?  I do the math on 675 + 450 and I get a DPS boost of about 2.3 w/out resists...

[Tastian]

And that's why it's hard to give truely accurate information and why I almost always end posts with "but do what works best for YOU in YOUR situation".  I know a few dozen people that are raving about pet affinity.  Know why?  They have bards in group almost all the time, they raid and have pet up to catch MGBs, they have pet snagging AE heals on raids, etc.  20 points is well worth it to have bard songs hitting pet, but for some it'll never happen.

Some beastlords don't fero much.  I know one bst that doesn't even fero himself lol.  I usually have up on 4 people and run savagery too depending on the situation.

Slowing also depends on group.  Just like hasting, shm buffing, etc.

If I'm MT'n an LDoN run or something I'll cast maybe half a dozen nukes the whole mission.

If I'm dps in LDoN and have kei/9 I'll click frost spear everytime it pops and throw in ice shard occasionally.

If I'm  a dps and a bard is around I usually chain cast two nukes.

Resists also depend.  I always snarl at BoT east, but love south ya know?  Most places I go cold nukes don't get resisted and neither does poison.  It does happen, but not very often.  

Two frost spears a minute without MP of any kind is only FT50.  Kinda silly to say that, but with kei, bard, FT15, 9, SD, etc it's not too hard.  Also I find a lot of stray downtime of late.  Doing an LDoN you can add ~3000-5000 base mana to slowly tick down during the 20-60 minute run.  Certain raids have breaks between cycles or well moving around, etc.  In some spots you'll have 100% uptime (chain pulling exp group), but that's not the normal situation for most people these days.

[TerjynPovar]

First off, you can't run two Frost Spears per minute.  You can run about 1.85 frost spears per minute, best case.

Beasties who are using a second nuke over Fero are lowering their DPS by more than the gain of a second nuke, with or without SCF3, unless they have truly bad weaponry and are using a really gimp pet.

Yeah, if I throw out slowing I can always use one nuke.  That still doesn't help me get up to two.

I don't ever seem to have both KEI and 9.  On very rare occasions I have been in dungeons where I can use multiple nukes, but it's so rare as to almost not count.  If you are talking raiding that's probably different, but by the time you get to raiding you are probably approaching the more uber beastlords.

Look, I've *never* denied that SCF3 can be worth it for a person.  I was just presenting the fact that it might not be worth it.  Everybody was so high on SCF3 in this thread till I piped up, with not one person presenting the "Oh but wait, it might not be the best for you" opinion.

As for me, SCF3 is ahead of only Feral Swipe in terms of the offensive AAs I plan to buy...behind Combat Fury, Bestial Frenzy, Ambidexterity, Sinister Strikes, Weapon Affinity, Warder's Alacrity, etc...and surely I can't be the only one in existence who finds it to be damn near dead last too.

[Tastian]

I understand man, and I hope you didn't/don't take my comments as anti you.  Yeah the usefulness of SCF3 goes up a lot as you get more uber (better procs, more mana regen, GoD nukes, etc).  I'm always in favor of people sharing various opinions and experience.  Also raiding I almost always have 9/kei, well 9 VoQ.  Lots of guilds I know are now going with MGB 9+symbol over MGB virtue.  It doesn't last as long and eats one more buff, but extra mana/hps/etc is often worth it.

Also downtime is a big factor in the mana for nukes.  This is one of the biggest things to consider when comparing melee to caster dps in various situations.  

Combat fury is actually extremely pricey for the return from a damage point of view btw.  CF3 is ~0.5% extra chance to crit.  With crits doing ~1.75 more damage and that's for 6 points.  You need to be doing ~100 melee dps for CF3 to be ~FS return as I recall.  Now that's talking uber bst imo hehe.  

Sinister strikes is ~3dps boost for 15AA so about .2 to FS's .167
Warder's alacrity 1 is ~1.6% boost to say 60dps (focused pet)  which is ~.32  Unfortunatly WA2-5 is the same boost for 6,9,12,15 hehe so it falls off kinda fast.
Warder's fury 1 is ~1% chance to crit, with crits doing ~.65% more damage.  With pet doing say 60dps you get  ~.13 Thankfully WF stays stable in cost, so doesn't fall off hard like WardA does.
Critical affliction 1 is ~.12 if you just use scorpion venom.  Later ranks it falls off big time.
Weapon affinity with ONE 150dd main and ONE 125 off is ~.35 for the first rank and then falls off greatly because of the increased cost per rank.

This is just GoD AA's of course, but feral swipe isn't "that" bad if only they'd fix the range and if it'd land just a bit more consistantly.  What get's me about GoD is there are several skills that from an efficency standpoint start out ok and then fall off, kind of like mental clarity and combat fury from before.  Things like Warder's alacrity 1 and weapon affinity one are solid deals (relatively speaking), but the higher in the skill you get the less the return.  Well skills like warder's fury are like BF and stay consistant throughout.

[Murkk Dakruul]

hehe actually Terjyn, I agree with you for the most part. :)

Curious, are you using paragon every 15min?. Should help with the mana. I've used 2 nukes for as long as I can remember, and im only at FT4 and MC3. Definatly hard to do if you're main slower though.

[dewddabst]

with KEI, can consistantly slow mobs, tank them, nuke everytime ice shard pops, also the occasional scorp ven every other pull.  MC 3, FT1.  not exactly sure what ur doing wrong.. ldon missions have no down time at all.

[Tastian]

LDoN's have something special(ish) though.  That is a reset button of sorts.  In an LDoN I try to always finish at ~5% mana or less. That means you can burn the 3k+ mana in your pool basically eating a mana loss per minute.  If you are solo'n for 2+ hours you can't take nearly as much of a loss in mana in/out per minute.  You can do this with numbers and I know what Terj is saying.  Basically MP, FT, Paragon, 9, etc and not having to burn mana on shaman stuff like slowing/hasting helps a lot.  Not fero'n is one of the biggest savings on mana I see bst do.  It's a shame because like Terj said fero is one of the most mana efficect things we can do to add mana to a group/raid.  However, many bsts (many people period) would rather see 10more dps personal than 20 more on someone else.  hehe  If you just have dominion, FT1-5 and maybe a kei then it's easy to see how you can't cast frost spear everytime it pops.  Heck I know some bst that solo that seriously have issues keeping fero up on themselves along with slowing every pull, stray heals, etc.

[TerjynPovar]

Yeah, I use Paragon every 15 minutes.

In most groups I get into, I have to slow and haste.  Slow + Haste + Fero eats almost all of my mana without KEI/9/bard song...and I have Spell Casting Reinforcement 3 + Extended Enhancement IV tribute running always.  I can't imagine even trying to run Haste/Fero without KEI+ if I didn't have 45% buff extension.

dewddabst...I notice you didn't mention Fero in your list of things to do.  As said if you aren't Feroing Beastlords have pretty much no mana issues at all.  If you ARE Feroing, then you are running with KEI + 9 + Dominion +bard song or something...Scorpion Venom?  In an LDoN?

/shrug

[Murkk Dakruul]

Ah well thats understandable. I couldn't use 2 nukes if I was slowing, casting haste(I use ornate BP) and feroing either. No matter the buffs or if im with a bard. :D

It just depends on your role in each particular group, if im in a group mainly for a DPS slot(which is usually the case), i'll chain trushar's frost and frost spear as often as they refresh. If im slowing/buffing/pulling/whateva I have to adjust.

[Hrann]

If I'm playing full shaman (buffs and slow) then I can't nuke much (although I still will a little bit).  If I'm just slowing, I usually cycle our 2 highest nukes, and may have to stop that once in a while if there's no necro or mod rods around (unless I have c and pot9).  If I'm not slowing, I cycle the nukes pretty much continuously.

Of course, some of that is dependent on whether I have no external buffs, c3, c5, c5+ pot9, or if there are other bsts, necros or mages around.

I always try to hit all the melees with fero too.

[katahn]

I'll get SCF before BF5 for two reasons.  The first is pet-kite groups where I can't melee, but instead have to "nuke" and the second being the wide array of LDoN weapon procs purchasable that can be placed on nice high(er) ratioed h2h weapons.  Since unlike CF, SCF not only increases odds, but increases damage, getting the 50 and 75pt lifetap procs on your "soloing weapons" or "tanking weapons" will do wonders if you crit them more often in terms of hurting the mob and healing you.

Its also very useful for beastlords with lower levels of haste, or no haste ecept what they can cast themselves.  Since proc rate is set per minute by the proc "spell", its a boost to DPS that is relatively constant.

[Rhaynne]

I'll get SCF before BF5 for two reasons.

I certianly hope you meant Combat Fury and not Bestial Frenzy.