Block Cap now unreasonable pre-cata?

[Kelaan]

Yeah it seems these changes will make mastery better then avoidance very early on. But the real question will be if it will be more interesting then stamina, when we try to reach that cap.

On the other hand, it's rare that we'll be making stamina-vs-mastery trades, since we can't reforge them to each other. We can compare EH to expected average damage reduction (avoidance + blocks), but I expect we'll in practice be deciding whether to reforge avoidance into mastery, mastery into avoidance, or either of them into threat stats if we're un-capped on expertise/hit.

[lythac]

Yeah it seems these changes will make mastery better then avoidance very early on. But the real question will be if it will be more interesting then stamina, when we try to reach that cap.

On the other hand, it's rare that we'll be making stamina-vs-mastery trades, since we can't reforge them to each other. We can compare EH to expected average damage reduction (avoidance + blocks), but I expect we'll in practice be deciding whether to reforge avoidance into mastery, mastery into avoidance, or either of them into threat stats if we're un-capped on expertise/hit.

With the current WoTLK damage and healing model I agree that a mastery/sta trade off seems unlikely. For Cataclysm depending on how far short we fall of block cap, using mastery trinkets (or avoidance trinkets reforged to mastery) may be better than sta trinkets if EH (and vengeance) if they enable us to reach blockcap.

[Digren]

it's rare that we'll be making stamina-vs-mastery trades, since we can't reforge them to each other.

On the contrary, you'll be making this decision each time you fill a yellow gem slot.

Pure sta (ignoring whatever bonus)?
dodge/sta
mastery/sta
pure mastery????

[Kelaan]

it's rare that we'll be making stamina-vs-mastery trades, since we can't reforge them to each other.

On the contrary, you'll be making this decision each time you fill a yellow gem slot.

(And someone else mentioned trinkets.)

Both are quite correct -- just as we trade for EH/avoidance. However, I was referring to the choices of what to do with the green stats on a given piece of armor (NOT whether to use a different piece altogether), in the context of reforging, rather than wearing something else.

Your point about gems, though, is even more interesting, IMO -- especially early on when we're gearing, perhaps for both dps and tanking roles. We could take a mastery/threat-heavy piece (e.g., str/hit/exp) and gem/reforge it for mastery (making it good for both ret and prot), and then take more tanky pieces and gem them more for EH. I guess I'll have to see what I can pick up (in terms of how choosy I can be) once I get there.

[Neptuno]

yeah, i never got a 2nd 277 tanking ring (and then i switched my rep to ret) and i find that the 277 rings with dps stats/mastery still positively contribute to both specs compared to similar 264 tank rings.