(BETA) Survival // AoE vs. Single Target - Theory

[Niix 169]

I want to say before any of this that you shouldn't be padding the meters needlessly, and as hunters our AoE damage in no way increases our single target damage, so if you're supposed to be killing a single target, do so, don't pad. Parsing will have its time and you can pad the meters all you want, but focus on beating the boss first, and do what you need to, even if it's a loss of DPS. 

 

 

So after some extensive testing tonight with Fancy on the beta I've come up with the following theories, and the only talent I used was lone wolf, with a stamina buff.

 

Explosive Trap is worth casting on two or more targets.

 

The evidence to prove this is this, I did a very very small test but considering the numbers I believe it to be accurate even as such a small sample size. I decided to cast 10 Explosive Trap on two raid dummies, total damage done was 157,900, with a crit rate of 23.8% (I had 24% crit so spot on), I then cast 10 Arcane Shots at a single raid dummy, and with a crit rate of 36% even including the Serpent Sting damage, it didn't even come close to the Explosive Trap, coming in at around 125,000. Even with an abnormally high crit rate for my crit chance, Arcane Shot still couldn't out perform Explosive Trap. It gets even better with three targets, and it should even be rotated in with Multi-Shot on 3 targets.

 

Multi-Shot is no longer a valid replacement for Arcane Shot on two targets.

 

Multi-Shot on average did about 7k damage with 0 crits including the instant tick of Serpent Sting, compared to the 7.5k damage from a non crit Arcane Shot, and for 10 less focus. it might be worth it to get up the DoT but other than that it is not good enough to warrant using it over Arcane Shot on two targets.

 

Multi-Shot is a 5% increase over Arcane Shot at 3+ targets.

 

Did some extensive DPS testing on substituting Multi-Shot for Arcane Shot in the normal rotation on 3 targets. Multi-Shot performed on average 5.3% better than Arcane Shot as a focus dump.

 

You should only purely AoE on 5+ targets.

 

I did pure AoE DPS on 3 target dummies and did 30% less damage than a normal single target rotation, and 37% less than a rotation using Multi-Shot as a focus dump. Assuming a 30% increase in DPS per extra target over 3, at 4 targets you'll do the same DPS, and at 5 you'll do more than using Multi-Shot as a dump.

 

(Just a note here, always be killing what you need to kill instead of padding meters.)

 

Conclusion.

 

I think what I've found here is the following things.

• Swap targets applying Serpent Sting with Arcane Shot on 2 targets.
• Use Explosive Trap on 2+ targets.
• Use Multi Shot instead of Arcane Shot on 3+ targets.
• Pure AoE is only an increase at 5+ targets.

I would love to get some more testing done now but it's super late and I'd like to go to bed. If anybody else could confirm or deny any of these 5 ideas please post here if you've tested these things for yourself.

 

With 6.0 just around the corner and survival in a weird state I'm curious to see if it's going to be viable and I will still be playing it on the first week of Mythic in order to see if it really is playing as poorly as SimCraft shows and I will post the weeks logs here for people to see. Our other hunter will be playing MM for comparison.

 

Cheers.