Hammer of the Righteous. End of Spelldamage weapon? (wotlk)

[Dorvan]

TLDR: Currently worded, ilvl 141 ish weapons are only 22 TPS lost from HotR if we use spell dmg weapon over tanking weapon. Might scale to maybe 60 TPS but probalby not much more. Spell dmg weapon would give all that TPS plus more back if consecration/seal/judges are used. HotR's innate threat may be very awesome forcing us to use it with priority over other abilities like HS if crushes are out.

I'd say making any assumptions about the meaning of the words "This ability causes high threat" is quite unwarranted at the moment. Without knowing what that innate threat component looks like, it's impossible to draw any meaningful conclusions about the relative threat values of spellpower and melee weapons. Patience

[lakhesis]

People seem to be working off the assumption that there'll only be spell damage or tanking weapons.

Based off my (very cursory) read of what wowwiki's got to say on iLvl's, you could knock Brutalizer down to 75dps and give it 100 spell damage - while keeping its defense & expertise.. or possibly swapping the expertise for dodge - to create a true hybrid tanking weapon.

I haven't seen any items from WotLK yet, but I think we're jumping to conclusions if we presuppose that bliz aren't going to stick in weapons like that...

- Lak

[Dorvan]

Who would use such a weapon though? The overwhelming trend is for more *general* itemization, not new niche pieces.

[Gideon]

If Blizzard is serious about making itemisation less specialised with greater appeal to multiple classes then the future of tanking weapons probably looks like this:

http://wotlk.wowhead.com/?item=34164

[Seloei]

Was just browing mmo champs and this caught my eye...

Shield with melee crit and spelldamage

This is going to be interesting once wotlk hits. Total change of tanking mechanics...

edit: quite a few other "plate" with spellpower has melee crit on it... int+stam+crit+SD

[Angelus]

Was just browing mmo champs and this caught my eye...

Shield with melee crit and spelldamage

This is going to be interesting once wotlk hits. Total change of tanking mechanics...

That's pretty much like any caster shield we have now, since the Crit will be for melee and spell.

I really liked being the only tank that used spell damage, feels more Paladin-like to me to be meleeing and using spell damage.

But, as much as I wish we'd stick to spell dam weapons, I'm thinking it's going to be another thing that gets taken by the watering-down of gear. Either way I'm sure the changes will balance it out for us in the end, no matter which way Blizz decides to go.

[Sharlos]

Was just browing mmo champs and this caught my eye...

Shield with melee crit and spelldamage

This is going to be interesting once wotlk hits. Total change of tanking mechanics...

That's pretty much like any caster shield we have now, since the Crit will be for melee and spell.

I really liked being the only tank that used spell damage, feels more Paladin-like to me to be meleeing and using spell damage.

But, as much as I wish we'd stick to spell dam weapons, I'm thinking it's going to be another thing that gets taken by the watering-down of gear. Either way I'm sure the changes will balance it out for us in the end, no matter which way Blizz decides to go.

I prefer the term consolidation. These changes hv only given us more options. (spell dmg enchants ect, still work.)

[Dorvan]

Was just browing mmo champs and this caught my eye...

Shield with melee crit and spelldamage

This is going to be interesting once wotlk hits. Total change of tanking mechanics...

edit: quite a few other "plate" with spellpower has melee crit on it... int+stam+crit+SD

As other have said, melee and spell crit, hit, and haste stats have each been combined, which was a long-requested fix primarily for Shaman and Pallies.

The shield you linked is a Holy Pally/Ele Shaman shield.

[Morendin]

here's the big catch if Hammer works as worded:
Weapon Speed.
after AP from raid buffs and natural str, you'd get more threat from the Hammer swinging a theoretical 41.4 weapon @ 2.7 than you would with a 100 DPS 1.5 speed.

Warriors NEED a fast weapon for a variety of reasons, so if 'high threat' is a multiplier high enough to make a high-dps weapon do more single target threat over time than a spell damage weapon via Hammer, we will NOT be sharing with them, we will be sharing with Enh Shaman, Rogues, Fury Warriors(though in theory speed is less important to them, as higher WW damage is counteracted by spikier rage generation leading to delays in their rotation*), and possibly deathknights.

Of course, this is pre-open beta information, and will probably get at least one revamp.

Personally, I'm ok with the current version of the skill, assuming:
NO weapon at 80 has tanking stats, and the sub-optimal stats are evenly distributed between fast melee, slow melee, and Spellpower weapons, IE:
A warrior would be interested in:
Furysword01,
130 DPS, 1.50 speed
40 stam
30 hit
xxx ArPen(I can't be assed to find the statpoint equivilent here )

EnhAxe02
130 DPS, 2.7 speed
40 stam
30 hit
30 expertise


Spriestmace03
41.4 DPS, 1.5 speed(for more judgement procs)
40 stam
30 hit
30 <insert stat that does meaningful things for true casters and us**>

*generalizing, as we don't have key information on the WotLK rage generation formula and other possible changes to theorycraft that deeply yet


**say, global crit if they make dot-ticks including consecrate able to crit

[Mavrix]

I've been looking over that as well. It would seem that if we do want a melee style weapon rather than a spellpower weapon, we will want a very slow one. This kind of eliminates the "tanking" weapons and pushes us into using melee dps style slow weapons so the best we can get in terms of stats would be things like stam, hit, crit, expertise.
I'm not as well schooled in how SoV works, but with the "revised" SoV/SoCor that we will be looking at possibly using as the main tank seal, would a slow weapon still offer benefit?
Also, I wonder how useful SoR scaling with weapon damage is if you really use a good high damage melee dps weapon (doesn't SoR still scale with a weapon's damage?).
Just some things running through my mind. Hopefully I don't end up looking dumb for not really thinking these things through or doing my own math. Working on very little sleep today.

[kram]

It seems SoR is scaling with AP now.
http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=8202602392&sid=2000

[Mavrix]

So which will scale better for improving SoR - Divine Strength or Seals of the Pure? I would suspect Seals of the Pure since it's a % increase rather than flat contribution based on Str, but we need to know the AP contribution to SoR damage as well as what other skills may now scale with AP (e.g. does SoV scale with AP? does HS? etc.).

[SmurfZG]

Tbh, I'm not convinced by this spell.. It's the ONLY spell we have that will need physical damage (i.e. ap, weapondmg). So, on the one hand, we have consecration, judgements, seals, shield slam and holy shield (and exorcism); the other one has HotR, and only that. Also, unless the high threat component is a multiplier of the dmg we do on a hit (the warrior and druid spells don't work like that do they?), the weapon damage will count for even less. Thirdly, there's still dmg on the spell dmg weapons, just not as much.

Also, if the spell was so good it actually warranted getting some strength and taking the 15% strength talent like some people were talking about.. Why even have other threat spells at all :S

I'm probably missing something though, please tell ^_^

[Mavrix]

Another thing: Do we even actually know that this ability (HoR) scales with AP or is that just a guess?

[Dorvan]

Another thing: Do we even actually know that this ability (HoR) scales with AP or is that just a guess?

Well, it does 100% of weapon damage, and weapon damage scales with AP, so yes.