You have zero DPS when you are dead. Staring at the floor of the dungeon admiring how much detail Blizzard put into the room. You are trying to avoid that one percent wipe. Since you are a fantastic DPSer you know how to stay alive. A Shadow Bolt leaves your fingers, but your screen shows…
Miss
Well that is not good. You have to HIT the boss to DPS the boss.
For warlocks (all casters, I guess that includes mages... but whatever) it is really easy… we have to pay attention to the hit rating on our gear.
WoWpedia.com tells us that no matter what level our chance to hit and miss is the following.
| Boss level | Chance to Hit | Chance to Miss |
|---|---|---|
| +2 (5-man) | 94% | 6% |
| +3 (10/25-man) | 83% | 17% |
Today you can reach 100% hit. If you reach the hit cap it is possible for your spells to never miss. (Prior to 3.0 you would hit cap at 99%.) Warlocks did have talents to increase your hit percent (Suppression and Cataclysm), but as of 4.0.1 there are no more talents hit increase.
You will need to stack hit rating to reduce your miss chance further in your gear and augments.
Each percentage of hit requires 102.446 hit rating at level 85. To hit cap you will need to round up so that you have 100% hit or more.
| Chance to Miss | Hit Rating | Hit Cap Rating |
|---|---|---|
| 1% | 102.45 | 103 |
| 2% | 204.89 | 205 |
| 3% | 307.34 | 308 |
| 4% | 409.78 | 410 |
| 5% | 512.23 | 513 |
| 6% | 614.68 | 615 |
| 7% | 717.12 | 718 |
| 8% | 819.57 | 820 |
| 9% | 922.01 | 923 |
| 10% | 1024.46 | 1025 |
| 11% | 1126.91 | 1127 |
| 12% | 1229.35 | 1230 |
| 13% | 1331.80 | 1332 |
| 14% | 1434.24 | 1435 |
| 15% | 1536.69 | 1537 |
| 16% | 1639.14 | 1640 |
| 17% | 1741.58 | 1742 |
So what is your hit rating goal at level 85? It depends. *grin*
Goal – 5 mans
We need enough hit to overcome a 6% miss rate. From the above table that is a 615 hit cap rating.
Goal – 10/25 mans
We need enough hit to overcome a 17% miss rate. From the above table that is a 1742 hit cap rating.
| Boss level | Chance to Miss | Hit Cap Rating |
|---|---|---|
| +2 (5-man) | 6% | 615 |
| +3 (10/25-man) | 17% | 1742 |
Keep in mind what your personal situation is when you play. Pick the number that is right for your game time. Anyone who tells you that 17% is the ONLY hit cap is W.R.O.N.G. and now you know why.
Also NOT having a 100% hit rate is not bad. We survived all of BC at level 70 being at 99%. Lots and lots of bosses died in that time. Don't sweat about it. If you do, you will start stinking up the place. I have enough trouble with all the undead locks around here. They need to keep their mucus to themselves is all I am saying.
Nice tidy explanation. One quick note, though - WoWWiki is dead - the good stuff is now at WoWpedia.com.
ReplyDeleteYou are absolutely correct. I didn't change it since that was where I originally had gotten the information. I updated the link.
ReplyDeleteI got hit cap on my lock, and my dps went down the toilet. I have since backed off to around 14-15% and am doing what I was before now in raids.
ReplyDelete@Jennifer
ReplyDeleteI can see that. It is all a numbers game. I think approaching 17% is the right way to go. We had 99% for a long time and bosses died.
It all comes down to stat priority really.
ReplyDeleteIt is not surprising to know some people might actually lose a lot of dps by trying to be hit capped since nowadays intellect and spell power are more valuable than hit, even before the cap.
You should never favor hit gems instead of intellect gems, the only hit gems you should use are purple int+hit gems in blue sockets which wield a socket bonus of 10int or more as a general rule. Different from times past it is more than ok to be under the hit cap how. Check out the BiS profiles at elitist jerks and note they are all under the hit cap.