Hunters: +agi vs +crit% (+1% spell crit chance or +spellpo..

Devastator's post on "+1% spell crit chance or +spellpower?" inspired me to
finally pose a question I have been thinking on for some time.

My hunter has a single top priority on gear: +agi. The reason being that it
improves my ranged AP and (slightly) increases my crit chance. I have turned
down +crit% gear if it had less +agi than my current gear. I have been
challenged on this by other chars (both hunters and non-hunters).

My gut-reasoning was that I'd rather have an increased base damage than
higher burst damage. As crits can't be "aimed" but are random I believe that
this is clearly more sensible aggro wise.

However, I am not so sure it really is the better approach dps wise.

What are the opinions of the other hunters here?

I have tried a mathematical approach:

53 agi = 1% crit
1 agi = 2 RAP

14 RAP = 1 DPS -> 7 agi = 1 DPS

-> 53 agi = 1% crit + 7.5 DPS

This would mean that a (fictuos) item that gives +53 agi is better than an
item that gives +1% crit, as it also gives +7 DPS.

So, how much +agi would an item need to have to be exactly as good as a +1%
crit item?

Basically we have: X agi = +(x/53)%crit + (x/7) DPS
If x<53 I will loose some crit based DPS which need to be made up by the
(x/7) DPS part.

Now things become complicated:
- how is the damage of a crit hit calculated? I didn't find an authorative
answer, I found sources claiming it's a factor of 2, others say 1.5, others
say something else agin.
- damage vs DPS depends on weapon speed, so the break even point varies
with the weapon I am using

Can somebody supply reliable information about how a critical hit increases
the damage? I would then be game to do the maths based on my current weapon


Cheers
Urbin, sticking to +agi until then
--
Urbin (60), Dwarven Hunter (PvE) @dunmorogh.de
Sunh (4, Nightelven Priest (PvE) @dunmorogh.de
Juran (24), Nightelven Druid (PvE) @dunmorogh.de
[FAQ] Get the alt.games.warcraft faq from http://www.ursbeeli.ch/wow [FAQ]

Urbin a écrit :

> So, how much +agi would an item need to have to be exactly as good as a +1%
> crit item?
>
> Basically we have: X agi = +(x/53)%crit + (x/7) DPS
> If x<53 I will loose some crit based DPS which need to be made up by the
> (x/7) DPS part.

In the large majority of cases, when you see a mail item with +agi,
+attack power, +crit and +hit, without any other stat, stop trying to
do complex maths and... just check the ilevel on thottbot. More ilevel
= better hunter weapon.

Now,

> Now things become complicated:
> - how is the damage of a crit hit calculated? I didn't find an authorative
> answer, I found sources claiming it's a factor of 2, others say 1.5, others
> say something else agin.

the base crit damage bonus is 100% of normal damage on ranged weapons
mortal shots crit damage bonus is +30%
"slaying" crit damage bonus is +3%

the final damage bonus is 133% of normal damage.

with a bow shooting at normalized speed, if autoshot hits for 300,
aimed shot hits for 1000 and crits for 2330 with all +crit damage bonus
talents, 2000 without any of these talents.

> - damage vs DPS depends on weapon speed, so the break even point varies
> with the weapon I am using

It doesn't depend on weapon speed unfortunately, because there is an
enormous gap in pure sustained dps between a slow weapon and a fast
weapon if you're using aimed shot. Basically you'll need to change your
model.

Quick example: if you have a 3s speed crossbow and a 1.5s speed bow,
and if in both case you autoshot for 100dps, and aimed shot for 1000
damage.

damage with crossbow//damage with bow
0:start shooting
1:0//0+100+start aimed shot
2:0//100
3:0+300+start aimed shot//100
4:300//100+1000+100
5:300//1200+100
6:300+1000+300//1300+100
7:1600//1400+100+start aimed shot
8:1600//1500
9:1900+start aimed shot//1500
10:1900//1500+1000+100
11:1900//2600+100
12: 3200//2800

The aimed shot model just doesn't fit both speeds. At all. Faster
weapons have one clear advantage, and that is in the first few seconds
of the fight. Any time later they get eaten up by crossbows. at a rate
depending on the amount of autoshots that get sucked inside the aimed
shot channeling of the faster weapon. In a long fight, crossbows
outclass faster bows even with one less aimed shot.

The hunter can adjust that (actually the hunter has quite a lot of
control over his dps, it's really not a matter of just spamming a key
and hope for crits) by resetting the autoshot timer with multishot at a
correct time and triggering the aimed shot at an equally correct time
so that only one autoshot (or even no autoshot, in the case of slow
crossbows/guns) gets sucked inside the aimed shot channeling time.

This will change in the Expansion with the probably new skills: steady
shot, and with the probable scaling of arcane shot with attack power.
And also with the rumoured switch to 1agi=1RAP thingie.

> Can somebody supply reliable information about how a critical hit increases
> the damage? I would then be game to do the maths based on my current weapon
>
>
> Cheers
> Urbin, sticking to +agi until then

I completely trust the ilevel check method, using looks as the
discriminating part between two hunter items with similar ilevel.