Thinking about two AA lines. Advice please.

[Somatic]

PVP Server-----------------------------------So the lines are:1.  go Focus 8 and fast cast 8. 2.  go melee 8-8-8 (100%,DPS buff, Proc)Questions:  the focus 8 also increases damge of spells? and fast cast 8 means I will have 4 or 5 in + dmg to spells....So Was wondering if u could go..Focus 8 - Spell Damage -8, fast cast 5?Anyway, advice on which route is the best?<div></div>

[Solar_Fla]

<DIV>The Focus and Disruption skill increasing AA is "ok" but thats about it. The skill increase on disruption does nothing at all except give you a SLIGHTLY higher chance and landing a spell on the mob but does not increase damage of any kind. Focus on the other hand is not a bad thing to have but if it is maxed out for your level increasing it any more isn't gonna help a whole lot. Focus does help ya prevent yourself from being interupted from normal damage but it doesn't help enough to justify spending that much AA on it I don't think.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I myself am a big proponent of the melee line but for some it isn't the way to go but I would highly suggest against the focus disruption aa's because I really think you won't notice that much diffrence using them and will prolly change your aa's after awhile to get those points back. I could be wrong in how useful they are but when I was experimenting with AA's i didn't notice enough of a diffrence to warrant wasting 8 points in it myself. Hopefully this helps a little, because focus only helps against normal damage interupts and not interupts that are procs or part of a CA or spell.</DIV>

[Somatic]

What do u guys think of this line instead:melee build Without the proc...8-8-8  except instead of going Proc branch go Spell Damage branch?Then can throw down Dots between melee swings?   Seems like this may be be better... hard to say??  what is more dmg 8 percent proc chance or throwing down dots that do a lot more dmg?<div></div>

[Shailen]

<DIV>I also play PvP and I just went with the normal sta 4-4-4-8 and int 4-4-4-8.  With the remaining points I personall tossed them in wis for resists (so very important in PvP), but I could also see people going with str.  I find that the 15%-20% boost in healing is huge in PvP as is the reduced cast time.  Shorter cast times allow me to get my skills in much easier between stuns and whatever else, and the healing boost means that for MOST pvp encounters I can rely purely on reactives.</DIV>

[menelaus109]

<div><blockquote><hr>Shailen wrote:<div>I also play PvP and I just went with the normal sta 4-4-4-8 and int 4-4-4-8.  With the remaining points I personall tossed them in wis for resists (so very important in PvP), but I could also see people going with str.  I find that the 15%-20% boost in healing is huge in PvP as is the reduced cast time.  Shorter cast times allow me to get my skills in much easier between stuns and whatever else, and the healing boost means that for MOST pvp encounters I can rely purely on reactives.</div><hr></blockquote>Out of curiousity why use the remaining points for wis rather than 4-4-8-8 Sta for the additional melee crit chance, is additional Wis/resists hard to get on a PvP server?I dont play on a PvP server but i would have thought an extra 50% melee crit chance would be more valuable</div>

[ericshaitan]

I use my remaining point for Spell Critz. <div></div>

[Shailen]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> menelaus109 wrote:<BR> <DIV><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Shailen wrote:<BR> <DIV>I also play PvP and I just went with the normal sta 4-4-4-8 and int 4-4-4-8.  With the remaining points I personall tossed them in wis for resists (so very important in PvP), but I could also see people going with str.  I find that the 15%-20% boost in healing is huge in PvP as is the reduced cast time.  Shorter cast times allow me to get my skills in much easier between stuns and whatever else, and the healing boost means that for MOST pvp encounters I can rely purely on reactives.</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE>Out of curiousity why use the remaining points for wis rather than 4-4-8-8 Sta for the additional melee crit chance, is additional Wis/resists hard to get on a PvP server?<BR><BR>I dont play on a PvP server but i would have thought an extra 50% melee crit chance would be more valuable<BR></DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P>Melee in PvP does me almost nothing.  If at all possible I try to avoid getting hit and know I'm going to take hits, but in the mean time use the distance to ensure me casting time to get up vengeane and repentance or a heal.</P> <P>As for resists they absolutely are critical, the extra 30 or so wis adds about 100 to all resists (rounding) and it adds up.  58 to a resist = 1%, so you're adding around 2% to all resist amounts.</P> <P>However, I also must specify that at the time, I wasn't geared nearly as well as I am now.  I could dump that wis and most of my resists would still be capped.  At the time though, with most people at 70 sitting around 2k in most resists I was trying to get every single point I could.  Same with mitigation.  Sniper shot and even ice nova do minimal damage to me, less than 1 heals worth easily.  In most cases less than 1 reactive tic.  when you take that little damage its much easier to win pvp fights.  Also since I'm doing 90%-95% of my damage from spells, the extra power is never bad.</P> <P>If anything I thought about putting those extra 8 points into int skills.  The extra 4 points of int will up my spell damage and another 4 points into my spell crits ups my spell damage again.  In PvP I can regularly land invocation on a mage and do about 1/3 of their life since for most people divine is by far their weakest resist.  If it crits it can do close to half damage if the person has really bad resists.  Also remember that in PvP, most of our spells get a BOOST in power, versus PvE, whereas melee damage takes a nerf.  Additionally we can debuff way more versus our spell damage than melee.<BR></P>

[Torbas]

Melee in pvp is very useful, especially with hard hitting slow weapons like the blackscale maul.  Why?  Well, because we get a 10% manadrain proc.  The slow speed of the blackscale means we have plenty of time to get spells off in between swings, and also makes for a pretty high proc rate (8/3*1/10=4/15 or roughly 28% chance to proc per successful hit), along with a nice critical chance.  Furthermore, Convict -does- lower physical resists, which helps.Typically in pvp, my lineup is M1 flames to lower divine and do some decent damage, followed by the appropriate vengeance proc (veng/repent for melees, heresy for crusaders/healers) and then Torment when i need it, all while keeping auto-attack on in melee range.  I usually drain around 1k mana throughout the course of an average fight, though I've drained much more in protracted battles versus my SK friend.<div></div>

[Shailen]

<div><blockquote><hr>Torbas wrote:Melee in pvp is very useful, especially with hard hitting slow weapons like the blackscale maul.  Why?  Well, because we get a 10% manadrain proc.  The slow speed of the blackscale means we have plenty of time to get spells off in between swings, and also makes for a pretty high proc rate (8/3*1/10=4/15 or roughly 28% chance to proc per successful hit), along with a nice critical chance.  Furthermore, Convict -does- lower physical resists, which helps.Typically in pvp, my lineup is M1 flames to lower divine and do some decent damage, followed by the appropriate vengeance proc (veng/repent for melees, heresy for crusaders/healers) and then Torment when i need it, all while keeping auto-attack on in melee range.  I usually drain around 1k mana throughout the course of an average fight, though I've drained much more in protracted battles versus my SK friend.<div></div><hr></blockquote>You realized proc mechanics changed right? too be more constant?A PvP encounter goes like this for me.  If i get the jump on them I open with repentance and vengeance.  If I think I need the second I hit them with a root first.  Then i drop their str and toss 2 DoTs on them.  And start to drop invocation as often as possible for bit hits.  If needed I toss a reactive on myself.  After they open and hit me enough to knock their health down I fear them to refresh the debuffs.  I do NOT reDoT or melee and hit with as many large nukes as possible to avoid breaking the fear early.  Once the fear breaks I redot with afflicaiton (really fast cast time) and start to make sure I have reactives up and I'm topped off.  At this point is where I'll melee the most because both my CC spells are down and I usually have them in the orange or lower.  If they run I immedately redot if my root isn't up (even if the DoT hasn't ticked off), and try to run them down to get them in range of something I can cast without stopping running (shocker if its up, or signet or whatever).The other thing about melee in PvP.  Is that 90% of the time people are running or trying to avoid closing with me once they know whats up.  Range spells are critical for a class that can't cast on the run (like a CA class).  Melee is great, but its still such a small percentage of the time I'm engaged with people.  At least the top end people at 70 know what their about.  PvP is NOT run, stand toe to toe and do as much damage as you can.In group PvP I'm not meleeing at all, because I need to stay away from taunts if at all possible, so I am group AEing, healing and debuffing almost exclusively.  The group AE's are key because each hit can again proc several different spell procs that I have.  I guess its not that I don't like dropping a 2500 point double hit on someone with the maul, but thats a terrible strat for PvP all things consdiered.  If you just run up and try opening up melee style you're walking right into the hands of most classes.  Our class has PvP strengths, you should work from those out.  Melee while a tool isn't a strength of ours.</div>

[Spider]

<P>while i agree at the same time it never hurts to have auto attack on with 100% dps buff 20% haste and 20% chance to double attack all for the cost of 4 power per tic which at higher lvls u never miss  u dotn have to actively try to melee but if an when (and they will) they come in range they got a whole noter issue to deal with  <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> </P>

[Shailen]

<div><blockquote><hr>lspiderl wrote:<div></div> <p>while i agree at the same time it never hurts to have auto attack on with 100% dps buff 20% haste and 20% chance to double attack all for the cost of 4 power per tic which at higher lvls u never miss  u dotn have to actively try to melee but if an when (and they will) they come in range they got a whole noter issue to deal with  <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> </p><hr></blockquote>Oh definately.  I always have my melee procs/buffs up and have my auto attack on so if I land a swing I get some damage, but I'm also actively trying to avoid closing the gap as much as possible.  While I need a melee to hit me for the procs, I'd rather they charge, get some hits, and then I get seperation again to re-debuff.</div>