The Care and Feeding of Warriors: Reforging and gear optimization resources for warriors
by Matthew Rossi 
Jul 30th 2011 at 4:00PM
Every week, WoW Insider brings you The Care and Feeding of Warriors, the column dedicated to arms, fury and protection warriors. Despite repeated blows to the head from dragons, demons, Old Gods and whatever that thing over there was, Matthew Rossi will be your host.
Last week, I complained that I was still DPSing in ZA shoulders. This week, Cho'gall finally dropped the tier 11 shoulder token. I got one day's worth of use out of it. And then Majordomo Staghelm dropped the tier 12 shoulder token. The lesson? Complain about drop rates when writing columns. You know what else doesn't drop enough? Everything I want, that's what.
As you might expect, my recent fortune in terms of new gear (I also got a nice new hat) got me thinking about how to best gem, enchant and reforge my gear in order to make maximum use out of it all. This is nothing new to this expansion, of course, but the cumulative effect of the variety of options we now have to customize our gear means it can all be somewhat complex to get everything lined up the way we want it.
This is where various gear optimization tools come into play. Much as we used to use (and still do use) spreadsheets to tell us which pieces of gear will provide maximum benefit, we now use gear optimizers to tell us what to do to our gear once we have it -- what gems should we use, which socket bonuses are worth gemming away from our usual and which ones aren't, what enchants in which slots will help us get maximum effect.
Sure, you can do this all manually, but with some statistics having hard caps and others having soft caps, and each piece of new gear changing each stat's amounts, it can be pretty daunting. Whether you're raiding in the Firelands or just beginning to get gear that can even take a reforge, it's worth taking a look at a few resources.
Last week, I complained that I was still DPSing in ZA shoulders. This week, Cho'gall finally dropped the tier 11 shoulder token. I got one day's worth of use out of it. And then Majordomo Staghelm dropped the tier 12 shoulder token. The lesson? Complain about drop rates when writing columns. You know what else doesn't drop enough? Everything I want, that's what.
As you might expect, my recent fortune in terms of new gear (I also got a nice new hat) got me thinking about how to best gem, enchant and reforge my gear in order to make maximum use out of it all. This is nothing new to this expansion, of course, but the cumulative effect of the variety of options we now have to customize our gear means it can all be somewhat complex to get everything lined up the way we want it.
This is where various gear optimization tools come into play. Much as we used to use (and still do use) spreadsheets to tell us which pieces of gear will provide maximum benefit, we now use gear optimizers to tell us what to do to our gear once we have it -- what gems should we use, which socket bonuses are worth gemming away from our usual and which ones aren't, what enchants in which slots will help us get maximum effect.
Sure, you can do this all manually, but with some statistics having hard caps and others having soft caps, and each piece of new gear changing each stat's amounts, it can be pretty daunting. Whether you're raiding in the Firelands or just beginning to get gear that can even take a reforge, it's worth taking a look at a few resources.
At the six-month mark for Cataclysm, I said that reforging is one of the most significant changes the game has ever seen. I may have undersold how profound the effect of reforging is. Forget that it allows you to tinker around with the stats of a piece of tanking gear to make it marginally better as a DPS piece to replace the blues you have now, or vice versa. That's nice -- but reforging is capable of far, far more.
Reforging allows you to tailor your entire gear set to a particular end. If your current gear is too high in hit and low in mastery for your arms spec, you can spend a few minutes at the reforger and shed that hit for mastery, or vice versa, depending on what stat your current spec favors. It allows a tank to reforge as much hit and expertise off of his tanking gear for avoidance and mitigation stats as he might desire.
Reforging continues the progression of customization options first seen with gear enchants and made more explicit in the jewelcrafting profession and socketed gear. Now, a player can aim for synergy across the board, aiming for stat caps and reducing stats that won't contribute to performance in his chosen role. Arms warriors, for instance, want a lot less hit than either fury spec. A prot warrior and a DPS warrior might both want a hit/mastery piece, but the tank is far more likely to reforge off that hit. A crit/mastery belt with a blue socket and a ton of stamina might be better for a tank than it first appears, and so on.
However, making the calculations needed to know how to reforge or otherwise optimize every single piece of gear, especially as you get new pieces of gear that change the overall values, can be trying. Effectively, reforging has a cumulative effect. It's not just what you do with this piece of gear, but with every piece. What a gear optimizer does is help you figure out what you want to do to keep your gear balanced. Let's look at some options now.
Rawr is the most robust tool of the ones I'm going to mention here. Rawr exists as an addon hosted by Curse (found here), but the addon really only exists to help export data to the program itself and display information in game. The program Rawr does a great deal more than that. Rawr allows you to test what your theoretical DPS will be in a combat situation based on your input stats and what abilities you'll use. It even takes buffs into account. Gear optimization is offered by Rawr, as well. Rawr is very customizable, and you can use it to suggest ways to best gem, enchant and reforge a piece of gear for tanking, DPS, PVP or what have you.
While Rawr is a very strong program for working on one's DPS gear, it does require some learning to get the best use out of it; it's definitely harder to use out of the box than some other options. While I wouldn't feel comfortable not mentioning it in a post about gear optimization, I also wouldn't feel comfortable suggesting it for beginners, either. Rawr has the most to offer you in terms of knowing just how to reforge, enchant and gem your gear to get the most out of exactly what you want to do, but it also asks for you to really become proficient in its use. I'd definitely recommend you give Rawr a shot. Especially with the in-game addon, it can export a great deal of information and help you work out exactly what you want to do.
Reforgenator
Mat McCurley wrote up Reforgenator back in January. While it certainly lacks the pure power and flexibility of Rawr, Reforgenator does what the name implies and does it well: It tells you how to reforge your gear via an in-game addon. You don't need to go to a site, quit and re-enter the game, or otherwise do anything but load up an addon in game to get the information.
Reforgenator really shines when you want to know immediately what to reforge a new piece of gear to do. It won't tell you what the best enchants or gems are, and it won't make reforging suggestions to fall in line with gem and enchant suggestions (since it doesn't make those), but I find it very useful when I just pick up a new piece of gear and I want reforging suggestions on my way to a raid or instance. It can be configured to make suggestions for various specs and can be told to ignore already reforged gear or to make suggestions for that, too. Furthermore, Reforgenator can be asked to make suggestions based on if you'll be running raids or 5-man dungeons, which is a nice piece of flexibility.
Reforgenator does what it sets out to do, but it really serves more as a quick-and-dirty guide to getting an item reforged. Since it lacks advice for or a means to take gems and enchants into account, it can't truly maximize your overall gear and certainly is not intended to have the range of functionality that Rawr offers.
Our final contender is somewhere in between Rawr and Reforgenator in terms of inclusiveness, features and ease of use. AMR is a web-based or app-based (iPod and Android) platform for evaluating the entirety of your gear. It handles gems, enchants and reforging. While AMR lacks Rawr's exquisite depth and breadth of fuctionality (you can't sim on it, for one thing) and it requires your armory to be up to date (meaning that, unlike with Reforgenator, you often will have to log in and out and may have to wait for the armory to catch up), it does a good job of providing a lot of detail without overloading you with it.
AMR can be set to include or exclude reputation gear, will suggest best in slot based on the level of content you're in. It can be set to ignore or include heroic quality gear from each tier and handles best-in-slot gear listings for every warrior spec. You can even tell it to excluse expensive enchants if you're just gearing up in heroics. For that matter, it can even exclude items with random enchants like the ones Al'Akir drops, if you don't like the idea of farming for gear that may or may not be good for you.
It compares favorably to Rawr, considering the level of detail Rawr is capable of presenting. I'd send the average warrior just starting to think about optimization to AMR first and have them play around with Rawr as they grew more conversant.
Which does what you want?
There is no doubt that all three of these tools have their uses. I use AMR between raids to tweak my gear options, Reforgenator in game when new loot drops or I buy a new vendor piece on my way somewhere, and I check each against Rawr when I have time to sit down and run through every permutation. I'd say Rawr is definitely the most thorough option, but AMR does a great job of giving you information without feeling like too much.
There are other resources, of course, like MaxDPS.com or Landsoul's excellent spreadsheets. But for pure gear optimization, the three presented here should cover pretty much any warrior, between the pre-raid tank just gearing up in heroics to the TG fury starting heroic Firelands. I'd be happy to discuss others, of course, and would love it if you guys would suggest new addons, sites, and options I missed this time out.
At the center of the fury of battle stand the warriors: protection, arms and fury. Check out more strategies and tips especially for warriors, including Cataclysm 101 for DPS warriors, a guide to new reputation gear for warriors, and a look back at six years of warrior trends.
Filed under: Warrior, Analysis / Opinion, Cataclysm
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Gad Jul 30th 2011 4:24PM
I have been using AMR since I started running heroics. It has definitely helped with my prot and fury optimizations. One thing I wish it had though is an option for prot specs like you say Reforgenator has: Raid or Dungeon? AMR's prot suggestions don't take threat into account at all. It always suggests reforging away Hit/Exp when sometimes I like a little extra for those zandom nuking PUGs (especially on a "Mount Run!" ...)
Thanks for the Rawr suggestion though, I'm going to look into it tonight. I think I'm ready to take my gear optimization up to the next level as I'm also finding AMR's gear suggestions for BIS to be a little odd at times. For example, it suggests Shield of the Blood God over Elementium Earthguard. Maybe I need to be corrected, but I just don't see how that 353 shield is better than a 359.
Alex Jul 30th 2011 11:01PM
It's because the 353 shield has 2 defensive stats on it, while the 359 has 1 defensive stat and 1 threat stat. So the 353 is better at defense. Same reason the 353 gun is better than the 359. Because of the very specialized way threat works with vengeance and raid bosses most theory crafting sites (and experienced raid tanks) will tell you to eschew threat stats like hit and expertise and go all out on Avoidance / mitigation to reduce your damage taken. However if you highly value threat stats for 5 mans then that's fine, but most of these optimizers are aimed at a different audience of tanks and probably won't suit you.
Boobah Jul 31st 2011 6:24PM
Well, with Ask Mr. Robot, you can tell it that you'd rather be hit/expertise capped if you like; the option is right there in the lower right corner.
The biggest issue for that, however, is that while AMR defaults to the raid caps, you pretty much have to look up the dungeon caps on your own (6% hit and 24 expertise, IIRC.)
Another AMR issue: I've seen it prefer hit/crit over haste/mastery pieces (of the same iLevel) on my elemental shaman, even when you can reforge to the hit cap with the second piece equipped. Yes, hit is worth more than twice as much as haste or mastery... until the cap. But crit is only worth 2/3 as much as haste or mastery. By avoiding the hit/crit piece I effectively replace all that crit with haste or mastery, while reforging lets me keep the hit I need.
Arrohon Jul 30th 2011 4:32PM
Great article as always! I use Ask Mr. Robot and am still not completely convinced on the stat weights. It seems to try to keep me at 8-12% hit and I think that I should be a bit higher. I'm not a theorycrafter so I just follow the suggestions as I don't know of a better alternative. I'll be sure to try out Rawr though.
Sqtsquish Jul 30th 2011 5:53PM
Rawr has a lil programming issue you see, sometimes it goes entire major patches without a specific programmer for the spec you are using. Imagine loading up your fury warrior and it still thinks fury has 8 base mastery and it doesn't yet include some of the incite changes.
Arrohon Jul 31st 2011 12:57AM
Ctrl+click=really long wait for optimizer!
Bill Jul 30th 2011 5:07PM
This is an off-topic observation, but why do Tauren warriors look like transformers every time they wear a good set of gear like the one pictured above? Or is that Optimus Prime? It's hard to tell....
Arrohon Jul 30th 2011 5:21PM
Tauren are supposed to look awesome in plate. I don't see the problem.
azhandyman.lima Jul 30th 2011 5:31PM
Every week I look at your Tauren - Warrior screen-shots and I compare them to my Tauren - Warrior.. And you are always 1 step ahead of me. I see your picture with an item I have my eyes set on and I get a little jealous (lol), but then I seem to pick it up in the next raid! =D I think two weeks back were gloves and a BH drop. This last week was a second two-hander, the shared-loot sword dropped for me (off topic , I really like it for its Crit). This weeks picture is showing off the new helm and shoulders. Tomorrow night we reconvene our 10 man progression on Alysrazor and we are hopeful that we will get her down. Will she drop a Greathelm of the Voracious Maw? I sure hope so!!! That does seem to be the pattern. ..and it has been going on for quite some time now. lol
Thanks for another great article Matt. I am definitely going to check out Rawr and MR. Robot tonight. I always cant help but look at all my gear and wonder if there is maybe another combination of gems/enchants/reforging that would benefit me more then what I currently utilize. It is a lot of numbers to crunch when you might be already short on time. What better then a program that can browse through the multiple combination's and find MAXIMUM benefit instantly. Awesome!
AlmightyKramer Jul 30th 2011 6:49PM
I currently use and HIGHLY recommend wowreforge.com. It has pre-loaded stat weights, but also lets you easily set those to whatever weights are appropriate for your spec/gear. I use it for all my characters besides my rogue (whose spreadsheet has a better reforging tool) and my druid (whose gear is extremely easy to optimize).
Gooner Jul 30th 2011 7:00PM
What about Landsoul's spreadsheet? I know its still in the beta stage but worth a mention as another option that is available
Arrohon Jul 30th 2011 7:51PM
"There are other resources, of course, like MaxDPS.com or Landsoul's excellent spreadsheets. "
First sentence of the last paragraph.
themightysven Jul 30th 2011 8:46PM
I like the death knight helm model on the tauren. that's good to know cause it's a weird squid head on everyone else
Alex Jul 30th 2011 10:51PM
I use Rawr exclusively for my Protection optimization. It's gear weighting is dynamic where (as best I can tell) AMR's isn't. So Rawr accounts for diminishing returns on dodge / parry, and increasing returns on Mastery, while AMR always values Parry above dodge, and dodge above mastery, which is incorrect. Reforginator doesn't cover gems or enchants, so I haven't used it.
Eskarel Jul 30th 2011 11:31PM
Actually AMR does take diminishing returns into effect. I don't know enough theory craft to speak for how accurate their weights are but the logic looks reasonable and the results work for me.
Grubba Jul 31st 2011 6:53PM
Does it? It doesn't seem to be aware that there's a hit cap for Arms, unless there's something I'm doing wrong (which is entirely possible). When I tell it to optimize, it gems and enchants everything for hit wherever possible, regardless of how much over the cap it puts me.
Caswow Jul 31st 2011 8:21AM
Yet another great CFW and on a topic I'd been curious about as well!
rkaliski Jul 31st 2011 9:45AM
Matthew,
There is a second way to ensure the top tier gear piece will drop. Deplete your DKP outbidding another class for the lower tier token. Works every time in my case. Problem is you then do not have the points to buy it and have to listen to the other guy gloat about his good fortune.
On the bright side, if your one of the Main Tanks, you can whisper to him "Should have given me the T12 shoulders" When he keeps dying pulling agro.
Smark Jul 31st 2011 12:32PM
I used RAWR for my Arcane mage and after talking to a few people and learning the whys of reforging as opposed to blindly listening to a website I found that RAWR was reforging me terribly and picked up a huge amount of DPS once I went my oen way. So word to the wise learn your class and do this yourself instead of the lazy way.
azhandyman.lima Jul 31st 2011 1:48PM
or learn how to use it the right way >.>