Berserk vs. Bloodlust timing

[Finandir Profile]

This may have been covered elsewhere, but I can't seem to find it. Should berserk be used during bloodlust or avoided? It seems that popping it at the beginning, along with Tiger's Fury gives more energy to use during bloodlust, but I definitely end up having to do a bit of energy regain after spamming lots of shreds. I have no idea if all of the effects actually stack or not. So, I don't know if it is an overall DPS loss or gain.

[morphiusrt Profile]

My understanding is bloodlust is a damage increase and berserk is a damage increase. Neither is going to go past any caps or anything either way.

Only thing I can think is if your white hits are faster you might get more ooc procs which would be a waste since you will lose any pooled energy anyways. But other then that I don't think it makes much of a difference either way.

On magmaw we usually save till hes under 25% so I usually have a 2nd berserk up by then anyways so I use it but I don't wait to berserk for bloodlust.

[Tinderhoof Profile]

Bloodlust raises our haste levels by a massive amount. While this didn't used to be a big deal in LK its a really big deal now as haste is tied into our energy regen.

I just tested this out with a friend. In normal unbuffed cat form I have 10.85% haste (1390 rating). When he hit bloodlust it shot up to 44.35%. What that means is your energy regen is through the roof. With BL and Berserk up at the same time your shreds are costing 20 energy and your energy regen is more then trippled. If you can line these cooldowns up its a sizeable dps increase.

Just remember BL last 40 seconds and Berserk lasts only 15. You usually have time to wait for TF to come off cooldown and time to pop your agi pot before you go crazy. Then shred to your hearts content.

[Finandir Profile]

On Magmaw, I've usually been hitting it at the beginning of the fight and then again during the bloodlust. For that second berserk, it has been pretty easy to line everything up - berserk, tiger's fury, Unsolvable Riddle use and an agility potion. But again, I just wanted to make sure I'm not wasting any of that by using it during the bloodlust. I could always do all of that before or after the bloodlust depending on the fight. I'm just trying to make the best overall use of what I have (pre-heroic raid, 2 piece T11 bonus) for the best DPS.

Thanks for the help and I look forward to hearing more from anyone that has done the math and/or tested it. From the suggestions here so far, I've seen one that says to go for it and another that says don't bother waiting. Unfortunately, that still leaves me not knowing which is best.

[Beanna Profile]

The only fight where I keep Berserker is Magmaw.
I usually use it early in the fight, after emptying my energy bar and used Tiger's Fury, as Ovale suggests it. This allows me to enjoy the early proc of Unheeded Warning and I'm guaranteed to reuse the CD as often as possible in combat.
Use Berserker while Bloodlust does not seem a good idea since regeneration energy is increased and prevents to empty your energy bar. It also increased the attack speed which produces more white hits and thus OoC procs that are not really profitable during Berserker.

Since Cataclysm, the BL is a kind of second Berserker or rather an Adrenaline rush and I think that we should not use them together. I personally don't wait for the BL to use my Berserker but I keep my Tol'vir potion for the BL since it's a bigger DPS boost (more energy regeneration means a lot of shreds and a great attack speed).

[morphiusrt Profile]

I agree with Beanna,

You are not going to run out of energy either way with berserk unless your swiping. So I think it would be waste to use them together. Especially if you get a couple of unlucky misses and end up full on energy (not likely but why risk it).

Thats just my opinion, I have no facts to back it.

[Leafkiller Profile]

I tested this in Mew on my toon's profile (equipped ilvl 358, 2 piece tier 11) and also the sample ilvl 372 toon. It makes no dps difference if you restrict Berserk to not be used during Heroism/Bloodlust.

So the short answer is use Berserk when it is optimal to do so - and don't worry about Bloodlust/Heroism.

Saying the same thing in terms of game experience - I have not had issues capping energy with Berserk up during Heroism, so it is not a dps loss to do so.

Here is the math (from the Mew source code): 100 / ((BaseTimeToEnergyCap) / (1 + haste%/ 100)) e/sec

Taking the 10.85% to 44.35% example:

100 / (10 / 1.1085) = 11.085
100 / (10 / 1.4435) = 14.435

So Heroism is increasing energy regen from 11 per second to 14 per second - which is below what we will use each gcd on most of our abilities during Berserk (17.5 energy for Mangle/Rake, 20 energy for Shred, 15 energy for Rip and 12.5 energy for Savage Roar).

[Arctagon Profile]

Does haste affect the length of our GCDs? I think not. 14.435 * 1.5 = 21.6525 energy every GCD, which is more energy than any of our abilities devour during Berserk.

[Leafkiller Profile]

Haste does not affect our GCDs - it does affect the speed of our auto attacks, and our energy regeneration.

[Arctagon Profile]

Exactly, so it seems that we regenerate more energy than we are capable of getting rid of, should we Beserk during a Bloodlust/Heroism/Time Warp, or at least in this instance.

[Leafkiller Profile]

I am not sure what your numbers are. During bloodlust we are generating about 14 energy per GCD (which is 1 second for us).

[Arctagon Profile]

So the GCD is lowered to 1 second during Bloodlust? I thought haste didn't affect our GCD?

[track_01 Profile]

cat form always had 1 sec gcd. thats nothing new. however me got another question.
even if you combine the haste effekt with a glyphed berserk, you get a maximum of five more shreds. dunno if thats a strong enough argument to reconsider a glyphed berserk :/

[Leafkiller Profile]

As you gear gets better, in the sim runs Glyph of Berserk gets close in value to Glyph of TF. Using the default sim script, it passes TF (although not by much). Using my sim script (with a slightly different rotation) Glyph of TF continues to produce higher dps.

What this does not take into account are fights like Magmaw where you can time every Glyph of Berserk to happen during the exposed head phase maximizing its value. That is something we have not simulated.

At this point using either should be fine based on personal preference.