Nightfall - Melee Hunter vs Ret Paladin

Special thanks to Taladril - https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/topic/20762086160
and Keftenk for testing things out for me here where we had an interesting discussion on taladril's discord regarding:

Nightfall
Binds when equipped
Two-hand Axe
187 - 282 Damage Speed 3.50
(67.0 damage per second)
Durability 120 / 120
Requires Level 60
Chance on hit: Spell damage taken by target increased by 15% for 5 sec.
http://classicdb.ch/?item=19169

Troll Hunter Nightfall:
+6% Haste Enchantments
Hand of Justice

+5% Battle Squak
+10% (+30%) Berserking

Average: 7.33% Haste
Max: 21% (41%) Haste

1350s/3600s Spell Vulnerability (37.5% ukeep) - Temple of Ahn'Qiraj, Blackwing Lair, and Molten Core tier level gear

* All tests used 10% Berserking.

Troll Hunter Nightfall:
+6% Haste Enchantments
Hand of Justice

+3% Juju Flurry (1%)
+5% Battle Squak (4%)
+10% (+30%) Berserking (.33%)
+20% Kiss of the Spider (2%)

Average: 13.33% Haste
Max: 44% (64%) Haste

1710s/3600s Spell Vulnerability (47.5% upkeep) - Naxxramas tier level gear

huge difference in uptime from aq level to naxx
TLDR - Melee Hunter Nightfall proc uptime - similar to me swinging Nightfall

Keftenk-Today at 2:01 PM

So, noticing a few things: 1. Ayeri, it appears you may be right. I only spammed Wing Clip and Raptor Strike if NF wasn't up. Once it was up, I just let Auto-Attacks go through. 2. More Haste and instant attack effects which don't eat a GCD like above seem to be best with Spell Vulnerability application. 3. Forgot to add Warchief's Blessing to all of the tests, so redid it once again.
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/415573477282545695/423948963813654528/unknown.png

Keftenk - Today at 2:34 PM
so, i actually just did a sor/jor 5-minute test. fairly good numbers
Keftenk - Today at 2:34 PM
68.33% upkeep
Keftenk - Today at 2:35 PM
but do note...this was a 5minute test
it could be skewed
Keftenk - Today at 2:35 PM
but i think it warrants an hr test
seeing a number like that

Keftenk - Today at 4:03 PM
I think it's a shame Alliance kind of gets shafted on extra-instant attack mechanics and Haste like Horde get, but Seal of Righteousness is absolutely more reliable than Windfury.

At least from what I've witness it sort of acts like a 100% opportunity to proc NF, where as Windfury is a chance to increase an additional attack. It's a bit obvious from these two tests though that Haste is the highest stat to weight when we want to maximize our upkeep potential for NF. Alliance does have a further option of acquiring 10% more Haste for 30-seconds, which stacks with Juju, but it's from a quest that isn't repeatable and it's BoP.

The item however becomes BoP sometime after Patch 1.3. Unsure exactly when, so you could conceivably create a million different characters and send the quest rewards to your main Paladin before they turned BoP. Or purchase them from other players. Here's to hoping Blizzard does item based progressive servers for Classic?

I am going to go out on a limb here and say that an Alliance Hunter is going to have an upkeep with Nightfall somewhere around or slightly below Retribution Paladin. They should realistically probably be pretty close. Again, Haste is the key here. Then abilities afterwards, which Seal of Righteousness from what I can tell is the most reliable in applying NF.

Interesting to note if a Retribution Paladin is the NF wielder then that probably means you want a Holy Paladin using JotC for Holy Water. The increased upkeep time the Retribution Paladin could offer for NF will outweigh the marginal DPS increase that they could make JotC do for the raid.

Btw, I did a brief 5-minute test with Shadow Oil. It never applied NF. This may not be Blizz-like though since I personally nerfed Shadow Oil and Lifestealing on Elysium and whatever Developer tackled this issue could have turned something off that wasn't supposed to be. You're welcome lol >_>;;
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/415573477282545695/423979651350921250/unknown.png

Keftenk - Today at 4:15 PM
i did not waste a judge on a NF proc, no. if NF fell off then id judge to get it back up, which is frighteningly a high chance to apply it
Melee hunter lol.
03/15/2018 05:07 PMPosted by Zezeall
Melee hunter lol.


we're looking at maximum Nightfall proc uptime so yes, Melee Hunter is actually number one in this regard to boost caster DPS by +15%...
2 Likes
Nightfall is mostly for Prot Warriors. If you're not tanking something, you're Nightfalling. You can also justify an Arms Warrior with it, especially when Blood Frenzy is available.
03/15/2018 10:56 PMPosted by Sarevök
Nightfall is mostly for Prot Warriors. If you're not tanking something, you're Nightfalling. You can also justify an Arms Warrior with it, especially when Blood Frenzy is available.


Not in Vanilla since Mortal Strike takes up a debuff slot and with a 16 debuff slot limit, Arms isn't viable or optimal in any way.

OT Warriors will use Annihilator to 3 stacks then switching to Nightfall and then back to Annihilator before the duration ends to refresh it:

Annihilator
Binds when equipped
Main Hand Axe
49 - 92 Damage Speed 1.70
(41.5 damage per second)
Durability 90 / 90
Requires Level 58
Chance on hit: Reduces an enemy's armor by 200. Stacks up to 3 times.
http://classicdb.ch/?item=12798

but an OT using Nightfall alone isn't optimal either as their uptime on the proc would be much less than either the Melee Hunter or Ret Paladin.

The only way the OT Nightfall uptime would be anything significant is if they use ZG Necklace and PvP Gloves to reduce the rage cost of Hamstring so that they can spam it as much as they can - but their individual DPS contribution would be absolute $hite in the process and their uptime would only be meh compared again to the Melee Hunter or Ret Paladin.

The breakdown goes like this.

Nightfall proc uptime:
1. Melee Hunter (by about 5-10% over #2)
2. Ret Paladin
3. OT Warrior

Individual DPS on their own:
1. Ret Paladin (by a large margin over #2)
2. Melee Hunter
3. OT Warrior
4 Likes
Nightfall is good on Enh Shaman or if a Shaman is providing windfury.
Does the total damage gained by a Hunter going Marks, and a Ret Pally using Nightfall, outweigh the 5-10% reduction in Nightfall up time?

It seems like it would only be a 4-6% reduction in total caster DPS across the raid. IDK if a Ret Pally and Marks Hunter would make up the difference? The optimal raid make up is pretty evenly split between casters and melee, though I think horde benefit from more melee. I suppose the reduction of 4-6% caster dps would only be a reduction in 2-3% total raid dps.

Would replacing a Melee with a Nightfall Ret, and respeccing a melee Hunter to Marks make up for that 2-3%?
Ita best on enhance shaman....LOL at melee hunter.
03/16/2018 08:33 AMPosted by Homonculus
Ita best on enhance shaman....LOL at melee hunter.


Don't knock it, Melee Hunters have the highest uptime on the debuff proc by far being able to spam rank 1 wing clip literally forever.

Enhancement uptime for the debuff would be below the OT Warrior - Windfury doesn't trigger procs so you can't factor that into the equation - Enhancement only has auto attack and Stormstrike to generate Nightfall procs.

Compared to a Ret Paladin using Seal/Judgement of Righteousness since both Seals and Judgements trigger melee procs:

Judgement of Righteousness - The damage of this judgement was increased significantly. This judgement can now trigger procs. The bonus from spell damage items has been increased slightly.
http://wowwiki.wikia.com/wiki/Patch_1.9.0

Suramar Paladin DPS Pre-BC
Published on Nov 4, 2006
https://youtu.be/l2mJVooeANs?t=42
1 Like
03/16/2018 08:20 AMPosted by Usui
Does the total damage gained by a Hunter going Marks, and a Ret Pally using Nightfall, outweigh the 5-10% reduction in Nightfall up time?

It seems like it would only be a 4-6% reduction in total caster DPS across the raid. IDK if a Ret Pally and Marks Hunter would make up the difference? The optimal raid make up is pretty evenly split between casters and melee, though I think horde benefit from more melee. I suppose the reduction of 4-6% caster dps would only be a reduction in 2-3% total raid dps.

Would replacing a Melee with a Nightfall Ret, and respeccing a melee Hunter to Marks make up for that 2-3%?


we're trying to figure that out now actually - what would each class do for their own individual DPS on their own right - then with the debuff uptime difference factored into a typical raid comp with 10-15 casters depending on the raid makeup
The biggest question from my end for raid optimization is what does more total raid dps? A hunter doing hunter things or a hunter being melee lol hunter using nightfall. From basic raid data parsing it looks like just the nightfall component is very close to the basic hunter dps. So virtually any extra dps a melee hunter would do would be a net raid boost over just regular hunter. This would mean an optimal raid would only have hunter do normal hunter stuff when needing tranq shot. Otherwise he's best served being a melee and keeping nightfall up.

Not good news to hunters who want to actually use ranged weapons. But that's what we're looking at here.
2 Likes
For the sake of ret paladins out there, I hope the pally with nightfall outdoes a hunter with slightly higher uptime spamming wing clip.

Even if they end up close to the same individual dps a ret pally still brings an extra blessing and bop/DI. Maybe a judgement if there's room for the debuff.
03/16/2018 01:24 PMPosted by Berrik
For the sake of ret paladins out there, I hope the pally with nightfall outdoes a hunter with slightly higher uptime spamming wing clip.

Even if they end up close to the same individual dps a ret pally still brings an extra blessing and bop/DI. Maybe a judgement if there's room for the debuff.


The Melee Hunter's individual DPS will be MUCH lower than the Ret Paladin by a fair margin.

The difference however is that the Hunter will be able to proc the debuff more.

That's the threshold that we're trying to figure out.
1 Like
Super interesting thread, thanks for all the time and effort putting the data together!
2 Likes
This is actually a fantastic thread. Keep up the good work and testing, my hunter brethren and I are watching.
03/16/2018 03:35 PMPosted by Sempi
Super interesting thread, thanks for all the time and effort putting the data together!


03/16/2018 03:45 PMPosted by Williams
This is actually a fantastic thread. Keep up the good work and testing, my hunter brethren and I are watching.


All credit goes to Cysthen/Nightninja as he was the one who theorycrafted it all in the first place - you can read his guide here back on the Nostalrius forums:

Nightninja's Melee Hunter Guide
http://forum.nostalrius.org/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=28163
BM Hunter NF (Rank 1 WingClip)> Fury NF > Shaman NF >= Ret NF.

BM Hunter has the highest uptime and will match warrior with Hamstring spam in terms of damage along with its buffed out pet.

Shaman NF brings totem utility and has the third lowest uptime

Ret NF is the worst.

No serious guild will take you as ret. You can raid though.

Esfand and a bunch of other Ret Paladins giving people false hope about this joke. Esfands damage meters for raids are hardly even real.
03/16/2018 04:54 PMPosted by Prollygutted
BM Hunter NF (Rank 1 WingClip)> Fury NF > Shaman NF >= Ret NF.

BM Hunter has the highest uptime and will match warrior with Hamstring spam in terms of damage along with its buffed out pet.

Shaman NF brings totem utility and has the third lowest uptime

Ret NF is the worst.

No serious guild will take you as ret. You can raid though.


what are you talking about, I have the highest NF uptime other than the Melee Hunter...

Seal/Judgement of Righteousness trigger weapon/enchant/trinket procs.

oh and...

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/396507528630108161/415326422903685120/double_ret_deeps_thaddius.jpg

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/403600214667034624/417261119791562762/thad_no_world_buffs.jpg

Fury would be better off going dual wield and focusing/boosting their own personal DPS in the process - you give Nightfall/Annihilator to the Off Tanks.
1 Like
03/16/2018 04:58 PMPosted by Theloras
03/16/2018 04:54 PMPosted by Prollygutted
BM Hunter NF (Rank 1 WingClip)> Fury NF > Shaman NF >= Ret NF.

BM Hunter has the highest uptime and will match warrior with Hamstring spam in terms of damage along with its buffed out pet.

Shaman NF brings totem utility and has the third lowest uptime

Ret NF is the worst.

No serious guild will take you as ret. You can raid though.


what are you talking about, I have the highest NF uptime other than the Melee Hunter...

Seal/Judgement of Righteousness trigger weapon/enchant/trinket procs.

oh and...

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/396507528630108161/415326422903685120/double_ret_deeps_thaddius.jpg

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/403600214667034624/417261119791562762/thad_no_world_buffs.jpg

Fury would be better off going dual wield and focusing/boosting their own personal DPS in the process - you give Nightfall/Annihilator to the Off Tanks.


A BM hunter with NF would do more than 1.1k dps and would be a much higher NF uptime. So would a fury war with a NF. I dont care about your Screen shot of trash dps being carried.

You are giving the average player false hope.
[quote="207604982228"]
A BM hunter with NF would do more than 1.1k dps and would be a much higher NF uptime. So would a fury war with a NF. I dont care about your Screen shot of trash dps being carried.

You are giving the average player false hope.

Wow you're the one quoting false hopes. Hunters are not that strong with dps. From a min maxing standpoint the ugly truth is hunters are only in raids because of tranq shot. Nightfall is an ability to boost their already bad dps. I would expect that a ret would provide more dps because they actually are a better dps class than hunter.
4 Likes