When to stop gathering haste?

[Alemi]

I utterly disagree that CL is horrible. For boss fights, maybe, but on trash if I don't use CL my recount DPS drops ~500.

I'd also like to keep this MOSTLY on topic for multiboxing. Timers, perfect rotations, etc, are all moot points for 5 boxing IMO - no one is going to get the exact optimal rotation with 4 shamans and a tank unless they're using cast sequences which have their own major latency delay. I think most people here (when 5 boxing) use castrandom or castsequences so talking about needing X haste to make this exact rotation work under 100ms latency is kind of silly. It might be helpful when solo boxing but not 5 boxing.

Using a castsequence on your shamans with your dk tank? I use 2 castsequences on my dk, each with 2 spells and 1 castsequence on the shamans for totems. I see no need to use any other.

CL on trash yes, but we're talking boss fights. CL is useless for single target dps post 3.08. Single target dps if you're using a castrandom, then you're not maximizing your dps, and this is a moot point. Pre 3.08, you wanted to stack crit, Post 3.08 you want to stack haste once you hit the 20% crit mark. The increase in dps from haste will outweight your increase in dps from crit.

Then again, if you're just using a castrandom and button mashing, then it really doesn't matter anyway. And I think Kaynin and I are both talking multiboxing, since we've both multiboxed Naxx, not solo play. I may be mistaken, but I'm talking multiboxing.

[Hachoo]

Using castrandom doesn't negate the benefits of Haste vs Crit, not sure why you would say that. Haste still makes you cast faster and crit still makes you crit more often, it really doesn't matter whether you have a perfect rotation or not. It might be as optimal, but it still has great effects (obviously, otherwise my DPS wouldn't change with gear).

I use a cast sequence on my DK because I have to really, and because it doesn't really affect anything. On my shamans, using /castsequence drops DPS and causes latency which is why I manually apply FS, manually cast 4x LvB, and then /castrandom the rest of the fight.

[Zzc2]

I think hit is better than haste until you get 200+ hit, then i go spell power > haste.
Hit is good because I hate when my lava bursts miss. Crit is nice because everytime a crit lands, my spell power is increased by 10% for next two casts. So getting to ~30% crit with buffs is good. After that, take haste gear as long as your hit > 200 / crit > 30% / spellpower not lowered.

[BobGnarly]

I honestly have to laugh at all the different voodoo approaches to picking stats that people have. Get X until the third day of the month, then take Y until your first son is born then it's Z all the way until you are level A, then take Q, and blah blah blah.

There are some fairly decent rules of thumb, like getting hit is a fairly safe bet until you're capped. Know why? No, it isn't because hit is just soooo awesome, it's because for its budget cost, it blows everything else away (meaning you will generally get more hit for a given piece of gear, so the upgrade will be greater). However, even these rules are subject to interpretation, and while I know I'm a pretty anal person about it, some of you could seriously use some education on the subject. To point, I'll make a controversial assertion: There are times, even before you are at the hit cap, when you might take crit/haste/spellpower over similar amounts of hit rating.

Haste is not crap, and it doesn't have diminishing returns. It has one HUGE advantage over crit and that is that it takes RNG out of the picture. You get X haste, that's what you got, just like spellpower. You get crit, and ya, over time it's going to provide X dps, but is it going to provide it when you need it? Maybe, maybe not. To be clear, I'm not saying crit sucks either, because its fun, decent, and has tons of other play as well, like elemental oath.

Bottom line - If you want a rule of thumb, sure, pick one of the ones listed here and go with it. If you're serious about really figuring out what is the best for your toon, you have to consider where your toon is now. The gear you have will always affect this decision, and BY FAR the best way to make it is to use some of the theorycrafting tools out there like RAWR. There just is no substitute if you're serious about it.

[Alemi]

Using castrandom doesn't negate the benefits of Haste vs Crit, not sure why you would say that.

Because your rotation is: "Whatever the RNG picks", it might be lb, lb, cl, lb, lvb, fs one fight then cl, lb, lvb, fs, fs, lb, cl the next who knows. The points that have been made are moot since you've just injected another sense of randomness to your own equation. What's in your cast random? Are you spamming it like has been suggested in previous posts?

Really, my point is, until you give us more information about your rotation or your castrandom and how you use it, there's no way anyone can tell you which one is better because the baseline of most dps theorycrafting, here and on other sites (like EJ where I post often) assume a standard rotation. Because rotation random #1 might benefit more from haste, but then rotation random #2 might benefit more from crit.

In all reality, you're probably just better stacking crit. The only real benefit elemental shamans get from haste is squeezing in another lightning bolt into the lvb rotation. Your dps increase would likely be marginal if you stacked enough of it since you're just throwing spells at random.

There are some fairly decent rules of thumb, like getting hit is a fairly safe bet until you're capped. Know why? No, it isn't because hit is just soooo awesome, it's because for its budget cost, it blows everything else away (meaning you will generally get more hit for a given piece of gear, so the upgrade will be greater). However, even these rules are subject to interpretation, and while I know I'm a pretty anal person about it, some of you could seriously use some education on the subject.

And to this point. The reason hit is so important for elemental shaman is that if you miss a flame shock, you don't crit a lava burst. If you miss a lava burst, you then don't get a guaranteed proc of clearcast and elemental oath. So, if you're not hit capped in a raid setting, you're relying a lot on RNG to put out continual significant dps.

[valkry]

CD on lava burst is 8 seconds, you can run with 0% chancre to crit oath will be up all the time yea? Except if you miss ofc.

[Fuzzyboy]

I think hit is better than haste until you get 200+ hit, then i go spell power > haste.
Hit is good because I hate when my lava bursts miss. Crit is nice because everytime a crit lands, my spell power is increased by 10% for next two casts. So getting to ~30% crit with buffs is good. After that, take haste gear as long as your hit > 200 / crit > 30% / spellpower not lowered.

I'm assuming you're kidding? :-)

[valkry]

The logic behund that seems reasonable, just needs to be tested if it works or not. I too believe that if you are critting every 3rd hit the clearcasting buff would be massive.

[Hachoo]

Using castrandom doesn't negate the benefits of Haste vs Crit, not sure why you would say that.

Because your rotation is: "Whatever the RNG picks", it might be lb, lb, cl, lb, lvb, fs one fight then cl, lb, lvb, fs, fs, lb, cl the next who knows. The points that have been made are moot since you've just injected another sense of randomness to your own equation. What's in your cast random? Are you spamming it like has been suggested in previous posts?

Really, my point is, until you give us more information about your rotation or your castrandom and how you use it, there's no way anyone can tell you which one is better because the baseline of most dps theorycrafting, here and on other sites (like EJ where I post often) assume a standard rotation. Because rotation random #1 might benefit more from haste, but then rotation random #2 might benefit more from crit.

In all reality, you're probably just better stacking crit. The only real benefit elemental shamans get from haste is squeezing in another lightning bolt into the lvb rotation. Your dps increase would likely be marginal if you stacked enough of it since you're just throwing spells at random.

There are some fairly decent rules of thumb, like getting hit is a fairly safe bet until you're capped. Know why? No, it isn't because hit is just soooo awesome, it's because for its budget cost, it blows everything else away (meaning you will generally get more hit for a given piece of gear, so the upgrade will be greater). However, even these rules are subject to interpretation, and while I know I'm a pretty anal person about it, some of you could seriously use some education on the subject.

And to this point. The reason hit is so important for elemental shaman is that if you miss a flame shock, you don't crit a lava burst. If you miss a lava burst, you then don't get a guaranteed proc of clearcast and elemental oath. So, if you're not hit capped in a raid setting, you're relying a lot on RNG to put out continual significant dps.

This post makes even less sense than your first one. I'm starting to think you don't understand how any of this works. You're saying haste is worthless if you don't use it to squeeze an extra LB in before a LvB? While I agree being able to do that is nice, its only a small part of haste helping out elemental shamans. Just because I use castrandom and don't squeeze in 5 LBs between LvBs doesn't mean the haste doesn't SPEED UP all of my casts, making my Chain Heals faster, making all casts faster therefore getting in more casts over the course of a boss fight then I would get in without haste.

The bottom line is, castrandom with 0 haste vs castrandom with 15% haste is a HUGE difference. castrandom with 30% crit vs castrandom with 40% crit is a difference also but I disagree that its anywhere near as much of a difference as the haste.

Your posts make you sound elitist except the fact that they're extremely narrow views and not looking at even 25% of the picture much less the whole picture.

[Catamer]

I think the biggest increase in DPS must be from a crit cast because of haste.

if haste increases your cast rate by 15% so that you have 15 more cast per 100, then any crit that happens in those extra 15 casts is a huge increase in dps. ( more that just 2x, it's more like 3x or 4x )
So you want both. a good crit rating and a good haste rating.