Demyn80

Here's the comparison(including set bonuses also)
+14 crit
225 spell damage/heal
+10 casting time
+5 max health
+20 power regen
120 dam for bloodcoil
65 dam for rot
160 dam for pandemic
45 dam for demi-lich
20% orb dam

Aramid shard set (extra 40 sd for forearm spot to make it 7 vs 7)
+18 crit
250 spell damage
285 pet spell damage
3% pet crit plus 25ish disruption for pet
appr. 1200/min encounter dam proc from robe
appr. 600 power/min for group from robe
appr. 1000+ damage proc from set bonus
3% reuse speed from gloves

It looks to me like the VP set will make YOU do more dps, but over all including pet, the shard set will give you more dps. I'm kinda bummed because my guild just cleared VP, and will be going in often now, but what pieces will I really wanna bid on? The forearm piece maybe but theres some pretty good forearms pieces in instances too. Shouldn't the VP set be second in power only to the new TSO set?

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Don't sweat the petty things, pet the sweaty things

Demyn80

OK, so apparently I can't use the space bar to seperate them side by side but you can see the shard set gives more spell damage for you, way more for pet, more crit, and a bunch of great procs. The VP set will give more int, health and power though, but still, VP set needs boosting I think.

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Don't sweat the petty things, pet the sweaty things

serum321

And for anyone who hasn't tested the power regen capabilities on the void shard armor, it is higher than bards or chanters regen. In a raid setting a necro was able to keep the caster group at practically full power the whole time without any other form of regen in the group.

Carthington

I concur with serum321, I am able to keep my group full power (for the time being) without blinking.

The pieces you actually want to bid on is just the shoulders now. See, before TSO, the best pieces to get for us were the chest, shoulders, boots, and pants (and in some cases, gloves depending on setup) I've dumbed down the set and only use shoulders on raids HOWEVER I have my VP set gear for survivability until I get the TSO fabled set so I would focus on the 5 VP pieces above until you get to TSO. The hat and shoulders are pure crap in VP. Keep all your gear though and don't throw them away until the level cap is raised. Right now I have the boots and shoulders for the TSO fabled that I now work in.

Now, as far as TSO aramid set goes, I would recommend getting everything except gloves, and do the heritage quest for the dark mail gauntlets they do wonders for DPS.

In a perfect troub group I have done upwards of 13k on raids built with 5/6 pieces of those aramid set. I have jewelry and some other stuff as well that helps.

Remember, this expansion, for the most part, is about survivability.

twisty

optimal for dps: 5pc t2 + Dark Mail Gloves + vp forearms or lava sleeves
survivability: 6pc VP set, but encounters where this is pertinent must be some ways deep into TSO.

i wouldn't break t2 5pc until you can get 2pc TSO fabled and 1 of those 2 is shoulders.

Sabutai

disagree, I'd wear the t2 robe hat and shoulders for the pet bonus, wear forearms, pants at least from VP. Boots can go either way.

You don't lose all that much from the fabled to the legendary set.

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twisty

ok, let me do the math, you tell me where i've gone wrong.



1. pants VP + 2pc VP bonus vs pants t2...

• 120dmg on Coil. i cast Coil now roughly only twice a minute, due to the fact that, with new base damage and Splurt, the dmg done by letting it tick to full vs spamming it for the BoE is roughly identical. so 240-300dmg / min from pants (incidentally it's 12dmg per tick so altering cast sequence back to spamming Coil for BoE won't make any difference).
• I do miss the +8disruption on pants oh so much. +5disruption for VP pants.
• 2pc bonus: 65dmg on Rot. I've just checked back my ACT, it seems i squeeze 15-17 Rots / min in stationary fights (best case). so 1000-1100dmg /min from 2pc.

------- 1400dmg + 5disruption (lets take maxes)

t2 pants:
3crit
35dmg
3crit pet
115dmg pet


let's even ignore crits 'cause they're somewhat harder to crunch (but as excersize for the user we can take them @20dmg per crit for another calculation).

• I cast about 25spells/min normalized - ie. +dmg divided for AE spells (i really cast about 31-33, but effective BoE is applied only equivalent of about 25times). 875dmg /min.
• pet casts about 20spells/min (normalized). assuming pet BoE not breaking any caps - the lowest cap btw seems to be around 420 - that's 2300dmg / min.

------3200dmg /min. let's cancel out 3% crit to me & pet with 5disruption (which is obviously a bit a high price for 5disruption, but let's do it anyway).

And, let's not forget that by not taking t2 legs and boots, you're also losing 5pc t2 bonuses, which are kinda a bid deal. the proc crits for 2.5k to 4.5k dmg, hits for 1.5k-2k, 2x min.

so, the math is not-even-close in favor of t2 5pc. where have I gone wrong, sabutai?

Sabutai

2pc bonus is wrong, if you're casting 15 rots a min should be in the neighborhood of 3-4k more dmg, the t2 5 pc bonus is only doing about 50-70dps, while the crits etc 'look' good its not actually producing all that much more dmg. While the pet +spell vs what you lose wearing the VP pants can be considered a push in terms of dps you can't ignore that the 120 to coil actually boosts its base so you take more advantage of higher +spell figures yourself.

And don't forget the 5 max health which helps with your lifeburn.

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Carthington

The problem with having the extra crit off the 5 piece bonus is that its only 70dps give or take about 5-10 so having the VP pants is actually a better gain overall, like sabutai said. And plus the vp pants help with TSO survivability given the max HP boost on top of it is really what we need in the first place. You don't get the crit mit though, but that is minor considering the HP boost.

I would go with the ts2/fabled boots though because of the pet bonus involved. You'd lose crit in favor of the pet's dps but in the longrun you won't notice that much of a difference in your own dps especially in a raid environment. Plus with the end lines the pets have extra spells they cast so having the pet abilities help a ton especially with reuse involved.

BTW, the legendary Arimid set does not have a 4 piece bonus, its 2 for int, 3 for pet, and 5 for proc... kind of sucks but oh well. The fabled set though has 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6

twisty

I took you for a more technical argument preseneter, Sabutai.

How does 65dmg increase on spell, cast 15x / min become "3-4k"? What makes you say this? I'ts 1k base. Let's take some +base increases, crits and mitigation debuffs - may be double it - 2k.

This makes no sense. Coil 240-300dmg / min. Again, let's double it. 600dmg/min. The fact that it boosts base makes no difference - you need around 1500 BoE to even touch lower end of Coil. Yes health for Lifeburn... ok nice. Not really apples to apples comparison 'cause LB utility is very limited often, but let's say +5k dmg every 5mins, 1k/min.
The dps from pants is absolutely not a "push" - it's a ~5k dmg / min landslide in favor of t2 pants (3200 + 3600 from factor in the crits for about 1% dps). Even with 2k 2pc VP bonus subtracted, it's still ahead by a lot.

This also doesn't make too much sense. It's actually a lot more like 80-100dps. 50dps would mean 3000dmg and that's lower 1 avg crit from it. It does proc consistently with listed frequency. But even at 3000dmg / min, it's still an extra 3000dmg / min that VP set pants have no answer for.