Ratanna's 3.1 TTL Best-in-Slot WotLK Guide. Hard Mode Loot

Personally, i would prolly skip 4setbonus of T8.
Chest and legs are ofc a given choise, and the head is very much like vezax head if you should want to swap in for a setbonus, however i see using shoulders/gloves to be gimping you more than buffing even with the setbonus.
At our current state i guess i could use the gloves to loose the least.
But once freya hardmode gloves are available its gonna be a tough call, shoulders are imo really bad for MTing :S
Depends a bit on how great the 4setbonus turns out, its only there for 50% of the fight afterall (it is however always a threatbonus)
Id prolly end up with chest/legs, then vezax head, and ofc the good old T7.5 shoulders... so might stay with T7.5 gloves for a while for the bonus :S

Ratanna wrote:15. Libram - Hands down no debate fucking amazing libram. FREEDOM libram is what I call this one. FCFS rotations inc.

Got this last night. frekking love it. Freedom atlast!
Does swapping librams doesnt cause a GCD? I tried it yday and it didnt seem to trigger one.
Swapping back and forth would break your consentration a lot tho, maybe macroing it into the skills?

I tried it when I got mine, you can indeed macro them. i.e.

Macro 1:
/cast Judgement
/equip Libram of the Sacred Shield

Macro 2:
/cast Holy Shield
/equip Libram of Obstruction

Interestingly, when I swap librams after casting Holy Shield (i.e. swap LoO in for LoSS), Tankadin claimed I kept the block bonus of LoSS. So in theory if you always follow Holy Shield with Judgement in your 9's slot you'd get both benefits here.

I did not test it rigorously though - I can do that today if I remember to. The fastest way would be to duel someone and just check Holy Shield damage before and after unequipping the libram.

theckhd wrote:I tried it when I got mine, you can indeed macro them. i.e.

Macro 1:
/cast Judgement
/equip Libram of the Sacred Shield

Macro 2:
/cast Holy Shield
/equip Libram of Obstruction

Interestingly, when I swap librams after casting Holy Shield (i.e. swap LoO in for LoSS), Tankadin claimed I kept the block bonus of LoSS. So in theory if you always follow Holy Shield with Judgement in your 9's slot you'd get both benefits here.

I did not test it rigorously though - I can do that today if I remember to. The fastest way would be to duel someone and just check Holy Shield damage before and after unequipping the libram.

this seems in theory to be the best method. i can't wait to get that libram to try this out.

That's... hardcore. Not really an exploit either. Very much looking forward to giving this a shot; it might not go the way of double-shield-slam because of the obscurity involved.

Now I want to see what kind of crits I get with both librams up and the four piece bonus ^_^

I just tried it, vezax libram buff will stay active indeed when you swap it to emblem libram after casting holy shield.
Just a quick test I ran:
1791 sbv and 4pc t8
3524 shor with no libram procs.
4061 shor with Libram of the Sacred Shield.
4218 shor with Libram of Obstruction proc.
4754 shor with libram swaping.
However it resets swing timer.

I tried this and incurred GCDs from swapping them. I was mid-combat at the time but I am fairly sure you don't get that option.

Of course I may be completely wrong, i didn't test them extensively because my guildies insisted it would cause a GCD but from what I saw they were right.

Swapping a weapon or relic in only triggers a GCD if you're not already in one, iirc.

In other words, if I'm standing there doing nothing and swap an item, it triggers the GCD.
If I cast a spell and then equip the item before the GCD is over, it doesn't incur a new one.

I'm pretty sure this is correct, since those two macros are exactly what I used to test it previously, but I wasn't in combat at the time either.

what makes you say the set bonus for tier 8 is so good?


and you stated, you would use shoulders over gloves for the 4th piece, why is that? i am just wondering because the gloves seem to be better itemized for main tanking than the shoulders...


is it because the offpiece gloves are better than the offpiece shoulders? what is it?


im not counting freya hardmode yet, so badge gloves > deconstructor shoulders?



how good is the 4pc anyways...


would it be better off using say t8 chest/legs, and t7 shoulder/gloves, and choose between general helm vs tier 8 helm?

Helmet - You could go with Helm of the Faceless Vezax-25, but I'm a fan of the block rating on the helm and the set bonuses.

The block rating is absolutely wasted especially when you're wearing this much avoidance gear, so that advantage is out. It's worth noting that while the set bonus IS good enough that you should pick 8.5 over Faceless given already wearing 3/5, shoulders are the worst piece of the set for TTL. So that means that if you're using any other offset piece - Saronite Plated Legguards, EoC gloves, hard mode loot, or don't have the chest yet - you won't be getting the set bonus and Helm of the Faceless is flatly superior. Also given the 50% uptime of the set bonus, it shouldn't really have as high a value for TTL as you're implying here; the helm and Saronite legs should up there.

Certainly, the 4pc bonus will make an excellent SBV set with the offset chest or 7.5 legs. But there's no way to take 4pc for TTL without also wasting itemization on block rating and ignoring offset options.

As an aside, XT's shoulders are disappointing, but I'd still wear them over 7.5. Hoping for a nice undiscovered hard mode drop in this slot.

I wonder if it´s feasible to work in the consecrate libram in between, but will probably run into issues.

Certainly, the 4pc bonus will make an excellent SBV set with the offset chest or 7.5 legs. But there's no way to take 4pc for TTL without also wasting itemization on block rating and ignoring offset options.

Personally I'd think that the extra SBV supplied from T8 with bonus is a bit under rated in the long run, especially when you have geared for avoidance in all other slots. Being a good MT is all about surviving the really hard parts of the encounter, this tend to be when healers cant get heals off in time (stuns, bad timing, line of sight) or an unlucky strike of un-avoided hits hit you. To counter this we use cool downs, equipping Ratannas trinket suggestions gives you 40s every 2 minutes of very high avoidance, DR when these trinkets are active will make other means of mitigation more powerful (like SBV and armor). Adding divine protection and hand of salvation (will be more viable to use with high threat from high sbv) to the cool down list makes it even more important to mitigate damage through damage reduction, as unlucky strikes will always happen from time to time.

As an end Ulduar gear selection for MT I think 4 T8 pecies will be a valid option (replacing the head piece).

//Dvindor

I did some testing myself about the librams.
They dont cause a GCD out of combat, however in combat they seem to trigger one. And if your spells are allrdy on GCD and you swap, that GCD seems to refresh, so if you use a spell, then half a sec later swap libram, the GCD will refresh making another 1.5sec GCD, having a 2sec GCD instead.
Dunno about macroing, it should swich instantly whith the cast, but id susspect there would be some delay every time (less than half a sec but still). if this would contribute or not to total tps done, i have no clue.
Its a good starter tho to open with holy shield (with its libram) swap to LoO then pull, judgement and shieldslam.
Then ofc go back to Holy shield libram.

About the shoulders. ill prolly keep my T7.5 over deconstructor atm, since im using 2part bonus of T7.5 untill freya gloves prolly.
7.5 offers more avoidance for a little sta and lots of hit (wich i personally think i allrdy got loads of, 6.5%)
Altho im gonna loose the hit when i get a few other parts, ill for sure swap to deconstructor shoulders+ freya gloves once thats an option.
Also, i dont think its gonna be worth using T8.5 for SBV gear.
The bonus gives 225bv with a 50% uptime.
With only 2parts giving BV, id rather take those parts, then the Unbreakable Chestguard http://www.wowhead.com/?item=45334 aswell as Wyrmguard Legplates http://www.wowhead.com/?item=45842 with http://www.wowhead.com/?item=40581.
Just by using those instead of the avoidance directed T8s, you get 219 more passive BV, isntead of a 225 with 50% uptime (cba to take str into account, but its still not gonna make the 4stbonus better imo)
IMO, 4setbonus is just badly itemised. and with gloves and shoulders beeing so bad compared to other available options i see no reason to actually have it, atleast not in your wishlist gearsetup. Using 8.5 head/gloves if you cant reach freya hardmode would be understandable imo. But no "MT" should EVER be using T8.5 shoulders over T7.5.
Thinking about it, we got 3/5 Block oriented parts in T7, and we get 3/5 Avoid oriented parts in T8. No set should ofc be 100% here or 100% there, blizz wants us to discuss the options to sacrifice "better" parts for bonuses etc.

Thanks for the new BiS list. Pretty much dovetails for what I'm working towards as a BS/soontobeJC.