Balance—how should I improve my dps?

[Hyodra 0]

Hello!

 

I'm a relatively new player, having started playing WoW in 5.3, and raiding in late October. I've looked up a lot of guides, watched videos and talked to veterans about my spec, and I feel like my performance could be a lot better (particularly on Garrosh). My guild is moving to heroics now, and I'm at the bottom of the charts on a lot of fights, which is... not good. Even in normals, though, I know that the healer should not be out-dpsing me. I'm lacking in the raid experience deparment, and I want to do everything I can to maximize my output.

 

Armory link:

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character/aerie-peak/Hyodra/advanced

 

World of Logs:

http://www.worldoflogs.com/guilds/312484/

 

My current rotation is:

 

Astral Communion until one wrath away from lunar eclipse.

Prepot at two seconds on the countdown, then synapse springs.

Starfall.

Wrath. (Puts me in lunar eclipse.)

Incarnation

Sunfire, then Moonfire.

Starsurge.

Starfire, but Starsurge whenever I get a Shooting Stars proc.

Starfall as soon the original Starfall falls off.

Celestial Alignment (as soon as I leave lunar eclipse).

Starfire/Starsurge.

Starfall when the previous Starfall falls off.

Then when Celestial Alignment falls off, Starsurge + whatever spell brings me closer to the next eclipse.

Refresh dots about 2 seconds before they're about to drop (or when affdots tells me to).

Synapse springs whenever they come off cd.

 

When Incarnation comes off cooldown, I try to save it until Celestial Alignment is up (or close to it) as well, and until I'm about to hit a lunar eclipse again so I can repeat my opening rotation. My synapse springs are usually on cooldown when that happens, and I'm not sure if I should prioritize having all my cooldowns available at once, or whether it's more important to just use my springs as often as I can and focus on just having both Incarnation and Celestial Alignment.

 

For Garrosh, the latest fight I know I made a lot of mistakes or decisions that would lead to sub-optimal dps (such as forgetting to click Incarnation immediately after hitting my first lunar, popping both Incarnation and Celestial Alignment at the same time to try to "catch up", letting my dots fall off at times, and I was even using the cat form aoe to compensate for my low mobility and survivability in the Terrace phase*.) Even on earlier attempts, though, where my performance was better, I still feel like I was underperforming.

 

This attempt: http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/vat71q2sfz66nk0f/sum/damageDone/?s=7159&e=7781 is one of my best. I believe I was doing everything I could, and I'm still doing less than 200k. I've been told it's a tough fight for balance druids, but I've watched videos of boomkins with less gear than me, and they have managed to keep themselves from dropping below 200k at any point in the fight.

 

I've tried a lot of things with that fight (mostly in Flex): taking Force of Nature, going with different haste breakpoints, keeping three targets dotted at all times in phase 1, saving my cooldowns for certain points in the fight... etcetera. Still, my output is really low no matter what I do, and I don't know if I'm just doing it wrong or if I haven't found the right strategy yet.

 

Any help would be appreciated. :\

 

* At the end where Garrosh is, I always try to keep my hurricane going until all the adds are dead, and that means that all the more mobile dps have already picked up their orbs (and maybe even more than that). That usually means I don't get to pick up an orb, or if I do, it's all the way in the back and when I'm trying to run and get it, Garrosh will drop an annihilate on top of me and then I'll die. lol

[Krazyito 521]

I'm not as well versed in balance as I could be, but the one thing I do want to mention is that the log you linked at the start about a healer almost out DPSing you is not a good one to go by.  With spoils, its a very gimmicky fight in that regard where if a good healer positions themsleves well enough they can do massive DPS with the buff they get, which they should be doing especially so with heroic Spoils.

 

I do hope someone else can come along and help you out, but if not give me a little bit and ill comb through it to see what I can find out.

[Tarazet 144]

Never use Glyph of Guided Stars! That decimates your DPS if you're following the correct opening rotation, because Starfall will not hit anything at all. Any other glyph would be better in that slot.

 

I was looking at what you said was the best Garrosh attempt. You had pretty low uptime on Nature's Grace, which tells me what your other big issue is. When you get a Shooting Stars proc, you need to use your instant Starsurge on the next available GCD as your top of the top priority. That's the whole reason why you maintain good DoT uptime (and yours was pretty good on that attempt).

 

If you are forced to be mobile, don't be afraid to spam Moonfire and Sunfire. That's pretty much all you can do, is fish for more Shooting Stars procs so you can keep things going. If you keep spamming your DoTs, you get a stacking buff which increases the initial damage every time you cast it. Don't resort to cat DPS, not even with HotW, because it is pretty much never going to be a DPS increase. You don't have the cooldowns and abilities that make it viable for a Guardian with HotW.

[Hyodra 0]

Ahh! Thanks! I knew dot uptime couldn't have been the only problem.

 

As for Guided Stars, I've had trouble in the past where going without the glyph would pull the trash onto me before the tank could get to it (on Garrosh, at least), but I guess it really depends on the tanks you have. Admittedly, my few experiments with it were in LFR where the tanks are usually not very good in the first place.

 

I will try to go without the kitty dps on the Terrace phase, but I expect a lot more embarrassing deaths to Annihilate... haha

[Bonita 8]

you shouldnt logoff within agility gear :)

got any new data?

[Moonglen 4]

Looking at your data I'm seeing a bit of an issue, that I think can be cleared up quickly. You need to understand your priority as a Balance Druid. Your goal is to be a feathered cannon of death, which means casting as many Starsurges as absolutely possible, this should reflect in your gearing, rotation, playstyle, etc... That means whatever you have to do in order to get more procs, DO IT! DoT crits=Procs, which means if you don't have 100% or darn close to 100% uptime on both DoTs, you need to work on that. Balance is a behemoth if you push it to its full potential. That means practicing constantly. I've played balance for well over a year now, and until a few weeks ago, raided heroic content regularly, and I'll fully admit that I'm still getting better every time I log in. You have a lot of courage asking for help, and myself and others are more than happy to lend a hand. Don't give up on balance, you will find that it comes with time =)

[Bonita 8]

quote of you:

"My guild is moving to heroics now, and I'm at the bottom of the charts on a lot of fights, which is... not good."

 

 

cant agree what you said. It looks better than you think:

look..

Ok so I now had a look to your logfiles from 03/25 (25-nhc) and compared them via epeenbot to other players ranked by WOL while considering your 566 ilvl non-heroic gear

(http://raidbots.com/epeenbot/us/aerie%20peak/hyodra/)

- Immerseus: 145k DPS. Looking good..with a lil bit more proc-luck and optimization you may reach 160k...but for me its fine

- Protectors: 263k DPS... too low tbh.. You need to get at least over 300k. Always DOT all 3 targets..use instant SS procs..
 SS was not your #1 dmg spell this fight. Also you had a point where your DPS dropped to 76k...DOnt know what this caused, but this ruins your overall DPS

- Norushen: 208k DPS ..fine for me...Would have maybe been 250k overall (including the time you spent on Test of Serenity. Dont forget: Your DPS will not be tracked if you and/or the one who records and uploads WOL-logs is doing this Test)

- Sha: 258k DPS: Just to remember, you have 566 ilvl...number is also fine for me..on a lucky day you may reach 270k/280k

- Galakras: Ignore LogedDPS - you did 0 DPS for a long of time..I guess you where ordered to stay on the tower to shoot down Galakras.

- Iron Jug: 262k DPS..also fine related to your gear-ilvl

 

Sum:

- Mostly your Dot Uptime is at 95%...Its good, can be better, but it is good.

- Mostly Starsurge is #1 dmg. Also fine

 

=>>> your DPS is fine enough...just a few optimization left

Edited March 28, 2014 by Bonita

[Hyodra 0]

you shouldnt logoff within agility gear

got any new data?

 

Sorry. Posted this a while ago, and I tank as well, so I didn't think about it. XD

 

Armory link: http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character/aerie-peak/Hyodra/simple

 

Latest raid night: http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/dc6yhlbjzk0exll4/

 

Latest Garrosh fight: http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/dc6yhlbjzk0exll4/sum/damageDone/?enc=bosses&boss=71865

 

(Yes, we wiped three times to MCs. lol. We had two pugs.)

 

I recently got the normal warforged Purified Bindings of Immerseus, replacing my old flex Bindings. I also changed to the solar opener, since I was told it was better if you have two rppm trinkets and the legendary meta gem.

 

My dps has gone up, in some cases dramatically (1.5 million is literally double the highest burst I've ever seen myself do), but I'm not sure how much of that has to do with being more mindful of my starsurge procs, the new rotation, or my new trinket. I tried my best to use my starsurges as soon as I could, but I think my Nature's Grace uptime is the same as it was before. I could be wrong, though. :\

 

----

 

I will try harder for Protectors. One thing I wasn't sure of was whether or not I should dump my starsurges as soon as I get them or switch to the marked target and then dump. I'm always worried about phasing Sun and He at the same time, which wouldn't be a wipe with my current team, but I don't think it would be all that desirable either. It's not so much a problem on the heroic attempts we've done, though, since they all have so much health that phasing them early is a non-issue.

 

And yes, I usually ignore all logs for Galakkras, since I'm always on the tower team, and I'm always on the cannons. lol. My aoe/cleave damage is quite bad compared to, say, our elemental shaman, or our dk, or our arcane mage.

[Tarazet 144]

Sorry. Posted this a while ago, and I tank as well, so I didn't think about it. XD

 

Armory link: http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character/aerie-peak/Hyodra/simple

 

Latest raid night: http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/dc6yhlbjzk0exll4/

 

Latest Garrosh fight: http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/dc6yhlbjzk0exll4/sum/damageDone/?enc=bosses&boss=71865

 

(Yes, we wiped three times to MCs. lol. We had two pugs.)

 

I recently got the normal warforged Purified Bindings of Immerseus, replacing my old flex Bindings. I also changed to the solar opener, since I was told it was better if you have two rppm trinkets and the legendary meta gem.

 

My dps has gone up, in some cases dramatically (1.5 million is literally double the highest burst I've ever seen myself do), but I'm not sure how much of that has to do with being more mindful of my starsurge procs, the new rotation, or my new trinket. I tried my best to use my starsurges as soon as I could, but I think my Nature's Grace uptime is the same as it was before. I could be wrong, though. :\

 

----

 

I will try harder for Protectors. One thing I wasn't sure of was whether or not I should dump my starsurges as soon as I get them or switch to the marked target and then dump. I'm always worried about phasing Sun and He at the same time, which wouldn't be a wipe with my current team, but I don't think it would be all that desirable either. It's not so much a problem on the heroic attempts we've done, though, since they all have so much health that phasing them early is a non-issue.

 

And yes, I usually ignore all logs for Galakkras, since I'm always on the tower team, and I'm always on the cannons. lol. My aoe/cleave damage is quite bad compared to, say, our elemental shaman, or our dk, or our arcane mage.

 

Yes, cleave in general is the Moonkin's weakness since Hurricane is no longer what it used to be. Still great against huge packs, not efficient against smaller ones.

 

You had about the same Nature's Grace uptime, but far higher uptime on your Eclipse buffs. That's good!