Well, it would depend on how these changes affect each spec.
Factors like individual abilities and their current restrictions in terms of damage dealt per target, how many targets they hit, along with their CD, etc. will play into the outcome. And as it looks now, it will be based on what’s called Square Root Scaling.
Total damage = (Damage on One Target) * (# Targets) * sqrt[(Target Cap) / (# Targets)]
To put it in simple terms, how it is now prior to 9.1.5.
If…
Spec A’s ability deals 300 damage per target and has a 10 second CD, and is capped at 5 targets
Spec B’s ability deals 200 damage per target, also with a 10 second CD, but does not have a target cap
…then, if you’re fighting 5 targets, Spec A will deal the most damage in total. (Spec A = 5*300=1500dmg per use) (Spec B = 5*200=1000dmg per use)
On the other hand, if you instead were fighting 8 targets, then Spec B would overtake Spec A as A can’t hit more than 5 of them, while B can = would then reach a total of 1600dmg per use.
With the changes for 9.1.5, it will look a bit different.
Same base numbers, but…
Spec A - 300 dmg per target, 10 sec CD, but now soft cap at 5 targets, and reduced above 5
Spec B - 200 dmg per target, 10 sec CD, still uncapped
Against 5 targets, it would still be the same as the previous result(prior to 9.1.5).
Against 8 targets?
Spec A would then look like this: 5*300 + 3*237,18 = 2211,54 dmg per use
Spec B would look the same as before: 8*200 = 1600 dmg per use
What about 20 targets?
Spec A: 5*300 + 15*150 = 3750 dmg per use
Spec B: 20*200 = 4000 dmg per use
Again, there are many factors that play into which would pull ahead of the other.
Damage per target/use
Ability cooldown
Number of targets
Individual target health(do they all die at the same time or not?)
Ability target hard cap/soft caps (Restrictions?)
Ability range/radius
And more…
Note: I’m not much of a numbers guy so if I’ve understood the Square Root Scaling-system wrong, how the scaling applies to the number of targets, feel free to correct me. My point is that it’s not a simple as “soft cap vs. no cap = no cap always wins”
You may also have to consider which spec does the best priority target damage, and how much of that can each spec keep up while also focusing on AoE. etc. etc.
Thanks for your time to put together that post. While I completely agree with your anecdotes regarding class/spec/ability performance vs the reality’s of a dungeon. That is all valid.
However… I’m a bit confused on your numbers. Based on your math above we are operating this idea in a vacuume, Great.
But as you arbitrary assigned base damage numbers to the 2 specs above, you put one spec at a 50% base damage disadvantage? Why? That immediately invalidates the end result.
Then I realized all of your math is not only handicapping one spec, none of your numbers have anything to do with the numbers available in the post you linked.
look at this
How are you calculating the 6th-8th targets as a static number? based on your base damage number it should look like 5X300+(√3/300)
Im just totally lost at the level of effort it appears you put into the post vs the nonsensical data you attached to it.
Either way, thanks for bringing these points up, here’s a spread sheet and chart with a bit more simple math, 1 ability dealing 100 damage to 20 targets applying the formula you linked.
I too see that stomp before the pet has gotten to mob, also see them head back towards me mid cast and I’m macroing things into keep them on mob , yet to see which move it is so dummy time for me to keep testing.
As for the Sylvanas fight, that is go MM or suffer I fear, my pets were so far behind it was better for me to dismiss/recast than wait. So yea that needs fixed 100%
Developer’s note: We’ve received a lot of feedback that these abilities not hitting enemies in their range in any way creates a feel problem for WoW combat but is also an issue for trivial encounters like farming legacy content. For many of the abilities that underwent the change from uncapped to a strict target cap in 9.0, we’re converting the damage to “reduced damage beyond 5 targets.” This means that the ability will deal full damage against 5 targets, then reduced damage to each additional target beyond 5. This means that while the overall damage done by the ability increases with the number of targets, the individual damage done to each target will decrease. This solution means these abilities and their relative classes will still have a very strong niche against packs of 4-6 enemies. As always, tuning will change as a result of this shift over the next few weeks based on your feedback from the PTR.
Spec A in my example above, was previously hard-capped at 5 targets, while in 9.1.5, it would instead be soft-capped at 5 and thus dealing reduced damage above 5 targets.
Spec B doesn’t have the niche of being stronger against smaller packs, but on the other hand does not have neither a hard cap, nor a soft cap attached to it, and thus, has a strict linear scaling in terms of damage. This makes it proportionally stronger against larger packs.
The reason I gave Spec A a higher base damage on a “per event”-basis, is because I wanted to highlight the differences in terms of how these changes with 9.1.5 can impact the outcome while keeping those aformentioned niche strengths in place.
Something you cannot show if all examples start with the same base.
Why?
I used the table on the wowhead page, and the values they put in. I may have made the wrong assumption in terms of how it would apply to each target, again, I’m not really a numbers-guy. In short, this is how I applied the math:
Spec A:
1-5 Targets = 1-5*300
+
I used the 8-target value that was 79.06% as a constant and applied it to any target that counted as 6 or higher, in this case, targets 6-8(3 in total) which would look like 3(300*0.7906) = 711.54
This would give the total of 5*300 + 3*237.18 = 2211.54
If I got that part wrong, and it should instead look like this: 5*300 + 300*0.9129 + 300*0.8452 + 300*0.7906 = 2264.61
…then, fair enough. I would’ve thought that the target-based value that is the damage dealt against targets above the soft cap would apply to all such targets as a constant, and wouldn’t be individually calculated for each target above the soft cap.
It ofc could work like in the second example, although that would IMO be very unintuitive.
Your suggested formula that is 5X300+(√3/300) results in the following: 1500.0057.
What’s that supposed to be?
Okay, as a counter to what you said earlier about my base damage values that were 300 and 200 respectively, why have you chosen the value 100?
Your table and the individual values do, in no way, match the table on wowhead. Wowhead also works with the assumption that there’s still a max cap of 20 targets that you can hit with any ability. I can’t say anything about that as I haven’t tested if that cap actually still exists in-game.
Why does your 5 soft cap column end at 0 damage when it counts against 20 targets? Wowheads table shows that against 20 targets, the relative value ends at 50% of base damage, not 0.
Why does your 8 soft cap column have it’s scaling reversed? And, why is the top deficit value(of what I assume is target number 9) only 58 when the base is 100? Why such a massive deficit in that column? Wowheads equivalent only drops from 100% down to 94.28% against 9 targets.
Edit: After a second look, I noticed that your linked image shows a table with the same numbers as the second table that can be found in that Wowhead article. That table shows how the numbers for 1 single ability would change from 9.1 to 9.1.5. I mean, okay, but that isn’t at all relevant to what I was comparing above. I was comparing 2 different abilities to one another, and how they would scale using the 9.1.5-system.
Wowhead also has a graph that shows how each ability starts with the same base damage values(per event):
In reality, it doesn’t hold up as all abilities do not work with the same base value(example: 100 damage per target per event).
On any fight were you have a mob or boss that gose out of reach or obscured from attacks you may need to call your pets back with the “Passive” button or a macro that causes your pet to stop attacking.
The reason for this is when a pet is instructed to attack a target it will attempt to pursue it even if it is obscured or has no path. This results in a stuck pet were they will stand in place while they attempt to reach the target. Once Sylvanas starts teleporting she is still obscured. Once she finally lands on the 3rd chain link you reach after the second bridge your pet will find a path and start moving towards her. The issue is you are still in combat. This mean you pets movement speed is set to its base so it will take some time for it to get all the way across both bridges and in range for you to use Kill Command.
As for you pet coming back to you in between command this usually happens when your pets default behavior is set to passive and you have gone a short period of time without hitting a macro with /pet attack and other basic abilities. The simple solution to this is to have every attack spell have this macro or to use Assist as your default pet behavior then you will only need some of your abilities macroed.
Personally I feel having your default behavior set to passive and having every attack spell (that is Kill Command, Cobra Shot, Barbed shot, Bestial Wrath, Kill Shot, and Multi Shot) works far better. I still haft to slam on my pets passive button on fights like Sylvanas to call them back during P2 but since I have adopted routines I have not had an issue on the fight since.
To be clear it sucks that these issue persist and that Blizzard seems to just not care about borked pet AI and it sucks that we as players haft to figure out how to make this stuff work instead of the team just spending the time to fix it. I think we should keep pushing at Blizzard to re evaluate there Auto Cast functionality as it clearly dose not work very well at all.
I have all those macro’ that you listed and keep the pet on Assist most of the time, yet once in awhile the pet does try to come back to me at the start of a fight aka the opening of a rotation and not sure what it is, but I’m going to sit on a dummy and rest a few hypothesis out.
but why would spec B’s per event basis be lower? if your going to use specifics, the do, if not apply the same base numbers and level the playing field
Because a higher base damage especially by that much means better scaling with multipliers, its invalidating because your not comparing the concept apple to apples
THB I’m not even sure if the wowhead numbers are accurate on a per target # basis or if they just applied the square root formula to 16 targets and scaled the line back for sake of example.
thats the square root scaling formula
Based off their second chart
Good question, I just applied the 100 damage base number to the reductions listed.
completely agree, but this is always why I’m saying either pick 2 ability’s head to head and bring in the added complexity of calculating their ability damage, or pick a number that’s applied to both evenly.
Either way, thanks for a constructive response and reasoning. Don’t see that much around here.
Because I did not intend for Spec B to have the same niche as Spec A; being stronger against smaller packs.
Edit
I deleted what I initially wrote in this reply.
My whole point with the initial reply was to answer your argument/question.
This one:
I responded with an example where it’s proven how the 9.1.5 changes CAN vastly alter the outcome, to the point where a spec with a previous hard-cap-turned-into-a-soft-cap approach would suddenly be much more of a “threat”, be more valuable even against larger packs.
Ofc we can use other base numbers to make it more “balanced”. But again, that would only change the thresholds. It serves no real purpose when looked at as a counter-argument to what you initially wrote.
What you wrote, does not call for any exact numbers. You asked/questioned whether a spec with an ability that has a soft cap, can in any way be a threat to one that has no soft cap.
Our bombs cd will be reduced even more when we Carve if there are more than 5 targets. This is going to be huge for bigger groups of non-elite enemies or a tank pulling multiple packs at one time.
Bestial Wrath Sends you and your pet into a rage, instantly dealing [Attack power * 0.65 * 1 * (1 + Versatility) * 1] Physical damage to its target, and increasing all damage you both deal by 25% for 15 sec. Removes Fear and Horrify effects from your pet.
Beast Mastery (Level 34)
Bestial Wrath’s remaining cooldown is reduced by 12 sec each time you use Barbed Shot.
Perfect! Frank has been very sad not being able to tickle lots of mobs since this abomination took affect. Sad part he’ll only be able to play with so many “friends” for about a month after this goes live. As End of December both of us are going on hiatus until I feel WoW gets back the fun factor.
