Loading ...8 Thoughts on Tier 8
With every new chunk of raid content, we are gifted with a new set of Tier pieces. It’s always fun to analyze the set bonuses they offer against the items outside of the set that we can use instead in order to determine whether it’s worth using 0, 2 or 4 Tier pieces. Ulduar brings us the following Tier 8 lineup.
Helm
10: Mimiron
25: Thorim, 58 Emblems of Conquest
Shoulders
10: Thorim
25: Yogg-Saron
Chest
10: Yogg-Saron
25: Hodir, 58 Emblems of Conquest
Legs
10: Hodir, Emalon the Storm Watcher
25: Freya, Emalon the Storm Watcher
Hands
10: Freya, Emalon the Storm Watcher
25: Mimiron, Emalon the Storm Watcher
8 Thoughts
- The 2 piece Tier 8 bonus is pretty underwhelming and certainly isn’t as strong as the old 2 piece Tier 7 bonus.
- The 4 piece is unreal and I want it now.
- The Shoulders are great because of Expertise Rating.
- The Gloves are good because of Hit Rating.
- The Helm is pretty average because of Block Rating.
- The Chest and Legs are really weak because of Block Value.
- The 4 piece is strong enough that I’ll wear 10 man gear over 25 man gear to complete it as soon as possible, but I don’t like that I’m going to have to wear 1 of the Chest or Legs to accomplish this.
- I would have liked some items acquirable through Valor tokens, but I feel like they make up for this by varying what bosses you get each piece from between the 10 and 25 man.
April 28th, 2009 at 9:15 am
Oo! I hadn’t realised that the tier pieces dropped from different bosses in 10 man than 25 man. That’s pretty cool.
*goes off to start planning*
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April 28th, 2009 at 9:16 am
I’m not sure I like the way they’re varying who drops what token in 10 vs. 25 man. It means the 10-man-only guilds can be stuck compared to the 25 man guilds that can run both.
Biggest example is the 10-man chest token that drops only from Yogg vs. 25-man from Hodir or a badge purchase. Granted, it is a relatively weak piece and 58 tokens will take a while, but it’s still out there.
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April 28th, 2009 at 9:46 am
I am up in the air with this set. Very dissapointed in how they have basically took teir 7 stats flip flopped them on different peices. What the shoulders have on teir 7 is what the pants have on teir 8. (That was an example dont hold me to that). I remember when there was a post about best sheild and there was a break down. I think posting something very similar to that would help people like me decide which peice I should go for first. Getting the whole 4 peice bonus goes without saying that’s a must. I don’t want to take peices from other guildies when I won’t be using it until all four peice are in my possion. This is a cry for help!!! lol
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April 28th, 2009 at 10:26 am
For Rhoche - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_before_E_except_after_C
Yeah, I’m a jerk.
Nice post, Vene. I’d already come to the same conclusions that you have, but like with Spinks, I didn’t realize that the token drops were different between 10/25. That should make completing that four set bonus a little bit more interesting!
I’ve not yet looked at the new Emblems of Conquest gear. I figured I wouldn’t bother until I had enough of them that it mattered. I think we’d all like to see your pick order.
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Rhoche reply on April 28, 2009 12:22 pm:
Nah man it’s cool. I care more about the point. I don’t take offense to any grammer police.
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Mullegan reply on April 28, 2009 10:57 pm:
“grammar” police. =)
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Rhoche reply on April 30, 2009 7:11 am:
You are making my point!!!!
Chet reply on April 30, 2009 8:05 am:
lol, I so wanted to say that, but held my tongue, so to speak…um, so to type?
April 28th, 2009 at 11:16 am
Beyond the stats (shoulders are droolsome, gimme that expertise!) I’m a bit concerned at the 2 piece set bonus. I don’t see myself un-equipping 2 of tier 7 because I simply don’t want to lose the 10% damage to Shield Slam.
I think I’d keep 2 tier 7 until I could field 4 tier 8 and depending on the fight may not choose to equip 4 tier 8 unless there was a fair proportion of magic damage involved.
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April 28th, 2009 at 11:29 am
The set bonus at 4 is nice, the gear itself is nice and I appreciate your quick breakdown, but you’ve forgotten to tell us the most important part -
Which items do I equip to look good?
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April 28th, 2009 at 3:10 pm
You don’t equip any of them to look good, I’m really not a fan of the Ram theme. But I guess after all the awesome looking sets we’ve had in the past that we have to take a turn at looking silly.
The gloves and shoulders are both nicely itemized, and the chest is the best high ilvl piece. (the other 226 chest option is block / block value)
From there, probably grab the hat. The 226 armour legs are pretty hot, and T8.5 isn’t really a step up from the Malygos legs.
There are hard mode gloves and legs (ilvl 232) so you’d probably stick with the hat / gloves / chest / shoulders and offset legs combo to keep the 4pc bonus long term.
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hao reply on May 30, 2009 1:26 am:
On this note, the Ironbark Faceguard (that’s inside Freya’s gift box) just looks hideous. My friends have called me “twilek”, tentacle-head, etc, but when i look at the +62 expertise on that thing, I really don’t care.
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April 28th, 2009 at 3:12 pm
The 4 piece bonus is awesome in naxx and sarth 3d. But I’m still unsure how valuable 20% magic damage reduction will be in Ulduar what can i say my 10 man run is slow lol.
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Harbinger reply on April 28, 2009 6:13 pm:
Yes, 4 piece bonus is good for Ulduar:
1. Razorscale: deep breaths and such
2. Ignis: good for MT, especially good for OT
3. Council: magic damage everywhere, nuff said
4. Auriaya: defo useful with her shockwave/shout thingy
5. Hodir: YES please (unfortunately it’ll be kinda hard to have 4 piece bonus AND capped FrR)
6. Mimiron: omg yes (mostly for phase1)
For the rest of the fights I don’t think 4piece bonus will make a difference. Though I have only started working on Yoggy and obviously haven’t seen Algalon.
I’m going for Head/Shoulders/Gloves/Chest and legs from Kologarn.
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Veneretio reply on April 29, 2009 10:41 am:
Ya, Kologarn’s legs are absolutely ridiculous.
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April 29th, 2009 at 7:27 am
The socket bonuses are underwhelming too, with the shoulders being the only stamina and the others all being avoidance (def or dodge).
Depending on how you gem it may be moot, but the socket bonuses on the Dreadnaught gear seemed more attractive to me. I thought the itemization was supposed to improve on the new gear. That was their excuse for some of the non-optimal itemization on Naxx gear, was so that there was room to improve without just increasing stats.
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Marrick reply on April 29, 2009 7:28 am:
Doh, it’s the legs that are the only stamina socket bonus, not the shoulders.
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April 29th, 2009 at 12:07 pm
thanks for this vene.
personally I like the look of the ten man set. It reminds me of Richard the Lionheart or something…interesting to see it on my tauren though.
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April 30th, 2009 at 12:30 pm
It seems to me that the chest is the worst piece. I agree that chest/legs are both weak. But diminishing returns on parry are much harsher and the rating to % base is also weak. It’s likely that based on commonly available gear you’ll get far less than the advertised 1.22% avoidance from the parry on the chest. So it really boils down to whether you want the extra 300 armor you would get from the chest enough to trade away more avoidance and more SBV.
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Trix reply on April 30, 2009 12:32 pm:
Edit: this takes the gear only at their face value and doesn’t really compare against other available items in those slots. I do like my Kologarn legs.
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Harbinger reply on May 2, 2009 7:10 am:
While you’re correct that both chest and legs are the weaker you have to check for alternatives before you dismiss either. On the legs front you have the excellent kologarn legs and even http://www.wowhead.com/?item=45708 (assuming you have the def to support em).
On chest you have nothing but a sbr/sbv piece.
Thus chest stays, legs don’t.
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April 30th, 2009 at 4:15 pm
Anyone have any numbers comparing the threat lost on the T8 2piece to the T7 2piece?
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May 1st, 2009 at 9:44 am
Just napkin math based on a recent single target wws it’s a about a 1% threat loss.
Shield slam is 20-25% of your damage
Devastate is a bit over 10%
10% crit is close enough to 10% damage, although a deep wounds build will get a fair amount more out of the devastate crit. So it’s a loss, but not really a severe one.
With how OP the 4 pc can be, we’re really in no situation to be bothered by the 2 pc.
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Veneretio reply on May 1, 2009 10:46 am:
Where things get trickier is that while the 2 piece on Tier 7 is stronger, the stat gain + the inferior 2 piece on Tier 8 may be enough to make up the threat difference. That said, these days I’m more concerned with living than additional threat.
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Myzery reply on May 1, 2009 12:23 pm:
I also believe that the stat gain from T7 to T8 would outweigh the threat loss from the inferior 2piece, plus the added survival to boot.
Gearing for survival is all I care about these days. It’s funny how drastic the focus of tanking shifted from Naxx to Ulduar. Naxx was all about efficient clearing and maximizing dps. Ulduar is all about positioning and not dying.
I can’t wait for 4-piece. 4-piece is almost TOO good, it makes me wonder how they will balance the T9 set bonuses.
One nice side-effect of 2pice T8 is the increase in dual-wield damage when not tanking in multi-phase fights. For example, P2 Mirmion, you can equip two slow 1hers and go to town. The synergy of 1h-spec, impale, deep wounds, battle stance with Devastate + Heroic Strike is somewhat respectable in tank gear. If you are quick at swaps, it’s also nice for Heart phase on XT-002, and Razorscale landings.
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May 1st, 2009 at 12:42 pm
For those upgrading from T7 25-man raiding gear with T8 10-man lewts:
Outside of the chest, all the T8.0 10-man gear is superior for survival and EH to T7.5 25-man.
CHEST
T7.5 chest is still surprisingly strong. Or rather, T8/T8.5 chest is disappointingly weak. Dragonstorm Breastplate, Chestguard of the Exhausted, and T8.0 are all roughly equivalent for survival purposes, but T7.5 trumps these. Stick with T7.5 until Ulduar25 gear, or your T8 4-piece.
LEGS
T8.0 Legs look to be a light EH upgrade over Malygos25’s Legplates of Sovereignty, but you’d lose a ton of expertise. I’d value them equally for everyday tanking, of course with T8 4-piece being the kicker.
HANDS
T8.0 > T7.5 for survival and EH. It’s an expertise loss, but entirely worth it in Ulduar.
T8.0 > Callous-Hearted Gauntlets (the previous top survival gloves) across pretty much all metrics.
Those funky Ignis 10-man gloves also look like an upgrade over T7.5 for survival and EH.
HEAD
T8.0 trumps T7.5 and Helm of Vital Protection for survival and EH. Ironbark Faceguard (Freya 10-man) will also replace any of your naxx25 helms.
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May 3rd, 2009 at 10:52 pm
I’ve also been thinking, but in order to get the 4 set bonus id’have to give up on SO many other stats…
I’m really thinking of keeping my T7.5 2setbonus ( using the chest and gloves ). While using the Ironbark Faceguard, T8 shoulders, and Maly HC Legs.
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May 4th, 2009 at 3:36 am
Wow, this post is somewhat confusing for me..
First, let me state that I have been out of the serious tanking game since Wrath (tanked up untill Brutallus in TBC).
But first I read you think Shoulders and Gloves are great because of Expertise and Hitrating.. Now I know that they are awesome stats (I hate trading in a inferior piece if I lose even a bit of Expertise), but don’t we want defensive stats first? (Defense, Dodge, Parry, BlockRating) and then the Threat-stats? (Expertise, Hit, BlockValue, Strength)
((All stats in random order))
And why are you bummed out by Block Rating/Value?
I would love to read a small explanation about this. (and if possible a short overview about what stats are in what priority!)
Thanks,
~Baruti.
(Damn, I should get back to serious tanking.. :P)
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Blackmambism reply on May 8, 2009 2:23 am:
block rating/value add very little to survivability compared to other stats, and the game has much more emphasis on survivability over threat then in BC, especially now in ulduar.
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May 7th, 2009 at 3:15 am
Guess I’m not getting my answer anytime soon.. =(
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May 8th, 2009 at 8:29 am
Thanks for the answer, Blackmambism!
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May 9th, 2009 at 1:00 am
why did u say SBV is weak and SBR is average? did I miss something? is SBR worthy for us warriors now? why so many ulduar gear have now SBR. should I bid the 10 man council cloak?
ty and sorry for so many questions.
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May 12th, 2009 at 2:56 pm
I have finally gotten 2pcT8 and combined with 2pcT7 I’ve seen a 8% dps increase mostly though higher deepwounds contribution.
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May 27th, 2009 at 10:15 pm
I think sbv is great, after capping hit and having decent expertise i find it really improves my threat, since the tier gear has avoidance too and is not like most block gear (just block rating and block value) i find it great for balancing my avoidance and threat.
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Veneretio reply on May 28, 2009 7:14 am:
How do you measure your threat?
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May 28th, 2009 at 11:30 am
I use an addon called omen, which i leave open during raids so i can veiw my threat compared to other players threat. If the dps cant go all out all the time in my guild (5-8k dps), they see it as a tanking problem. Nothing like a 9k shield slam crit to keep you way ahead.
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Veneretio reply on May 28, 2009 12:24 pm:
I suspected it was Omen that you used. The thing about Omen is that while it’s fantastic for comparing your threat to someone else’s, it’s pretty bad for gauging personal threat gains when swapping gear around. The reason is because sustained threat is what is important not burst threat. If you stack block value then you absolutely will do more burst threat, (and you’ll see nice, big numbers on Omen) but you will also do far less sustained threat. A focus on capping Expertise and Hit is going to do far more sustained threat than a focus on Block Value. (but it won’t look as pretty on Omen as a result)
All that said, the weakness of the Block Value tier pieces is that Block Value is a very lackluster defensive stat and generally speaking, we’re always approaching content from “How does this help me live?” not from “How does this generate more threat?” Threat can be solved in so many other ways that it’s a waste to have a 2nd rate threat and defensive stat on our tier gear which we badly want to use always for the set bonuses.
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Vivilros reply on May 30, 2009 10:39 am:
What would you suggest for measuring your own threat? And what about us tanks who don’t have the luxury of just picking up any gear we want just to see if it’s better threat?
(that sounded a bit bitter didn’t it?)
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May 28th, 2009 at 2:14 pm
Honestly, besides the armor gain and the four-piece, I’ve been very reluctant to even pursue tier gear. The shoulders are really the only piece that stands out as amazing, a few pieces seem sidegrades to what I have, and some are outright downgrades. Furthermore, we don’t have tank priority, and since every other non-tier tank piece in existence (all right, so not really) has dropped, I wouldn’t even want to think of getting my hands on tier before the others can have some.
On another note, though… four-piece would’ve been SO nice on Mimiron last night.
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May 28th, 2009 at 10:09 pm
I’ve always found having too much defensive stats to be a bad thing though, If you just focus on surviving your threat gets incredibly weak. My approach to gearing is balancing threat, stamina, and avoidance which i think tier 8 has done nicely. Of course i still pick up extra tank gear for a highly defensive set should i need it. Currently running with 4 pieces of 8.5 including chest/legs and lovin it. Just wondering though If block value does not give good sustained threat after capping hit and expertise then what does? is Shield slam not our biggest threat move? should i gear for ArP and crit or somthing? seems more difficult
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Blackmambism reply on May 30, 2009 6:27 am:
i’m currently sitting at 28 expertise (7%, just got t8 shoulders, wewts) and 7.5% hit, and threat is rarely a problem (and we have no rogue or hunter in my 10 man). so yes, capping hit and expertise are awesome for threat, and block value/strength most likely next, but in the most part block value seems to be a wasted stat. after capping hit/ex, i want more survivability, not threat
then again, there’s fights that require less survivability and more threat then others, so that’s what different gear sets are for
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July 4th, 2009 at 3:25 pm
” * Devastate: Weapon damage increased to 60% and bonus per Sunder Armor on the target increased by 20%.
”
The 2 set of t8 isnt that bad in 3.2, or do you think?
discuss:
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July 4th, 2009 at 3:43 pm
well just calculated that going from 1.5 times the normal wep damage to 1.6 times it = 1.6/1.5=1.0666… , which means they buffed or devastate damage with 6.6% Woooot amiright?
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Roffe reply on July 4, 2009 3:47 pm:
nwm that :p
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