April Fool’s posts usually come in a couple of varieties. There’s funny/clever, and then there’s cruel. I opted for funny/clever yesterday, but I was very tempted to go with this,
“In the next minor patch Serpent Sting tics will automatically be able to crit. The T9 2-set bonus will be modified to increase the damage of Serpent Sting critical tics by 5%”
See? Not real and certainly not funny. So my question is this. Is it time for Blizzard to make Serpent Sting crit without the need of a set bonus? I think so.
Right now the two-piece T9 set bonus is just awesome. This is due to the two-piece T10 bonus and the way Chimera Shot refreshes Serpent Sting. Remember it refreshes the sting with any percentage damage modifiers that were in place when the sting was cast. It also got buffed in patch 3.3.3 and the crit. damage is even higher now.
Very high-end hunters are able to reach the ArP hard cap and retain two pieces of item level 258 T9. And us mere mortals are seeing huge dividends in our item level 245 pieces. Here’s a look at my Serpent Sting numbers from this week’s Festergut (25). The crit damage was averaging close to 3K, well more than double the average non-crit damage.
Furthermore, I didn’t even have the best possible Serpent Sting applied. As you can see my stings were only critting 60% of the the time. I’ve gotten that well over 80% before, and I’ve seen others get the crit chance as high as 90%.
When a new tier of gear is added to the game I think the intention is for players to fully upgrade to that tier. Okay, trinkets may be an exception, but certainly not the other armor pieces. Now that doesn’t mean that everyone should opt for four pieces of their tier set. Depending on the spec two-pieces and off-set pieces should be a viable option. But having to dip down to a lower tier because it gains you more dps just doesn’t make a lot of sense.
I doubt will see any changes for Wrath, but I’m hopeful that it will become standard fare in Cataclysm. What do you guys think, is it time for Serpent Stings tics to have the natural ability to critically strike, or should we just enjoy it while it lasts and be prepared to remember it fondly come Cataclysm?
Currently my frost badges are stacking up because there's no point in spending them to get the 4-piece t10 bonus at the 251 ilvl. I love the 2pT9 bonus, but I feel like it might end my gear progression for this expansion sooner than I expected/want.
As for making it permanent, I'd like that, but I'd also worry that it would cement Improved Stings as the preferred dump talent for SV with Replenishment. With the extra talent points and tree flexibility in Cata this might not be such a big deal, but right now I regret having to take points out of Resourcefulness and Hunting Party to go deeper into the MM tree.
With no hard mode gears tier 9 and standard arp cir attack power gear and agility gemming
I was getting 3376 crits max and a 71% crit rate I am sure I could have got more if I popped a wild magic pot
Hell, I'd be content if they made it a Major Glyph. It'd be more DPS than freaking Glyph of Steady, even.
Glyph of Stinging Serpents – The periodic damage of your Serpent Sting ability may now be critical strikes.
Allows us to use T10/264 gear, and doesn't involve an absolutely massive DPS loss in doing so.
I think Rilgon's idea is pure awesome/genius, but I recall a blue post from a few months back where Blizz developers mentioned that they like gear design/choices where a lower tier set bonus makes lower level gear equivalent or superior to the next tier of gear. I think they were banging on about interesting gear choices not based on boring stats while trying to justify simplifying stats on gear in Cata???
I agree a major glyph would great too. I doubt we'll see anything change now, and who knows how relevant it will even be come Cataclysm.
From today's warrior Q&A…
"Almost all dots will crit. The exception will be things like Deep Wounds and Ignite because those are already the product of a crit. Rend will crit.
We are really striving for scaling parity for the various specs and classes. This means that stats like haste and crit can't be awesome for some characters and terrible for others. Most abilities need to benefit from haste and crit. "
Won't know for sure until tomorrow if this includes serpent sting but I don't see why it wouldn't
@Wynd – It certainly sounds like it could be a possibility for Cataclysm. Tomorrow should be an interesting day.