Hey guys -
I’m no min/maxer, but im certainly trying to learn the seemingly endless intricacies of classic locks as best as i can.
Specifically with regards to PVP -
When should we NOT be equipping a spellstone? Up to this point i have yet to get a good off-hand drop, and so my off-hand is some green i got levelling in my 40s. So i always have a spellstone equipped instead going into PVP.
Obviously you need to equip it before you go into combat, so unless its a duel setting, where you already know who you’re fighting and can prepare, you would just need to have it equipped always.
When the time comes that i get some nice shiny new epic off-hand drop, what is the rule of thumb for using spellstone vs offhand?
If i see a mage running toward me in WSG or something, I’m probably not the kind of player to add ANOTHER keybind to my already bloated warlock set for a macro for equipping spellstone/re-equipping offhand at a seconds notice. I would probably just have one or the other equipped at all times and roll with it.
But which one??
Advice is greatly appreciated!
Your spellstone should pretty much be equipped in pvp 24/7 unless you know for a fact that there are 0 enemy spellcaster threats. The minor damage bump from having a better offhand isn’t worth getting caught with your pants down.
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“When should we NOT be equipping a spellstone?”
Against melee pretty much. Also if you are affliction, and don’t think you will be spamming too many SB or SP’s then the crit from the Spellstone is useless and it would be better to use that Green Offhand of yours which should have +Spell Dmg to help all damage you do. So my opinion is different then Dot’s.
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Of course an affliction lock (SM/ruin in my case) facing a rogue or warrior would have little use for a spellstone, but like i mentioned, in a BG or world PVP setting where who im going up against isn’t foreseen and can change in the blink of an eye, i probably won’t go out of my way to change between spellstone/offhand every 10 seconds, especially seeing as how doing so engages the 30s CD on spellstone
So like Dot said above, its probably best to just always have spellstone equipped, even if my off hand is BiS?
It has it’s uses for sure, just sucks that once you use it, it is gone and now you have no Offhand bonus for the rest of the fight. I would much rather have that AV Exalted offhand for the Sta bonus and the +30 some dmg.
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Yeah i feel that - stam and SP go a long way for us, esp in PVP.
I’m wondering then, esp if i have fel hunter out (really the only pet i have out in PVP), that it might be best to go for an off hand with that extra stam instead?
Otherwise, spellstone + felhunter is a serious gimp vs melee…
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Removing a single warlock/spriest dot is worth 100 stamina.
There is pretty much no world in which a little extra spelldamage is worth more, other than melee only. Plus, swap it once you pop it and you’ve got your spell damage for the rest of the fight.
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OP didn’t want to use a swap macro if it is used or if they are going against melee, so it was going to be a base always have Spellstone or Other option. In a perfect world one would want to swap back and forth as applicable.
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I suppose im not necessarily against doing this, i just fail to see its’ efficacy.
If i join a WSG and see 5 rogues/warriors, and 5 locks/priests/mages, Its a coin toss. So i can run into a warrior, quickly equip offhand, cool. But 5 seconds later a mage comes up and i can’t really equip the spellstone - either im still in combat, or im out of combat, equip, but the 30 seconds cooldown is engaged, meaning that spellstone is useless for 30 seconds - probably longer than the encounter will take, esp in a BG setting.
So i just fail to see how effective it would -really- be to swap back and forth. Unless anyone has advice/clever ideas to somehow make this more effective?
i mean…the better pvp spec is fire anyway so 1% crit is never bad at this gear level
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As a fairly hardcore pvper, I’m siding with Döt.
When not on CD, have it equiped. When on CD, have normal offhand equiped.
I have a macro that auto equips my normal offhand after i use the spellstone. Also note that offhands with stam/int do not increase your current hp/mana when you equip it, it just raises your max. Even when fighting melee, you should have the spellstone equiped in case a caster tries to kill you before you can burn your target down.
Even in phase 6, this is probably going to be true. The on use is just THAT good.
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spellstone doesnt have a cd. The only cd it has is the same 30s cooldown that every “on use” piece of equiptment has when it is equipped. (the same as equipping trinkets like toep/zhc/engineering reflectors/ tidal charm.
ps. just so i don’t look like an idiot, i made sure to try it out just now. so as long as you have a shard you can make and equip a new one to use.
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Just equip fire stone and don’t consume. If you are in pvp you’ll go out of shards super fast if you chug spell sones and health stones every fight.
Warlock has good burst if you can get fear off. Your biggest challenge is having right pet for the fight.
Right - This was the “cooldown” i was referring to, i used a poor word
It still holds that it would be a serious hassle to have to wait 30 seconds every time you re-equip a spellstone after having equipped a regular offhand when encountering a rogue or a warrior, though, dont ya think?
to be honest, i just keep the spellstone equipped all the time and if i use it, i just make a new one and equip it. fights dont last long enough against warriors/rogues to worry about not having the stats from an offhand anyway. so its no big deal. also you don’t gain the health/mana(from int) from equipping a different offhand so it seems like more of a hassle to me than its worth.
on the other hand if you are running certain add-ons you can make a delay macro that will equip a different offhand after using your spellstone with a 1 second delay.
Spellstones have a 2 minute CD before you can “use” it again.
That’s when you’d equip a normal offhand, because you can’t consume another one during that time period, so +spellpower and main stats would be more beneficial than simply 1% crit. Not to mention you don’t gain ANY benefit from having an empty offhand during a fight after you’ve used it, and you can’t create another one in that fight.
At this stage is barley matters. But during the later phases, your offhand is much better.
you are completely wrong. there is no “use” cd. if you don’t believe me, try it.
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This is incorrect.
I just tried it in game. There’s no cooldown other than the 30 seconds after you equip it.
Doesn’t matter if the buff gets consumed by damage or not. You can even overwrite your spellstone buff with another spellstone buff.