The Spirit Realm

For my warrior i usualy use 1 AC = 5/6 HP to compare stuff or augs, for exemple a 10AC aug is better then a 50HP one

How many Hp an AC is worth for shaman? 1? 2? 3? more?

For exemple what do you prefer between:
25AC aug and 50Hp aug?
or between:
25AC aug and 40Hp aug?


ihave only 1500AC atm for 10khp full raid buffed and i ask myself i should start to focus more on AC to get higher than 2k for exemple instead of trying to get more and more HP


Thanks

Correct me if I'm wrong, but about the only time HP vs AC comes up as a topic for shaman, it's in regards to putting an AC aug in our shield (shield AC is not subject to the ac softcap). The softcap is really low (1300'ish??), so even with moderate gear, you very quickly see hugely diminishing returns on AC.

In other words, always choose HP over AC for augs, unless you are a very high end shaman, and then you might consider an AC aug in your shield.

Its also popular to use 2-3 resist augs from don vendors until your gear has sufficient resists on it. I raid buff to around 13k hp, and am just now phasing those resist augs out.

1300 even with max mitigation/avoidance AAs??

it seems low to me, i thought it was more around 2kAC


my problem is i die too fast in xp group(rss/mpg/KT) or dod missions if i get jump by an add i would like to mitigate more the mob dps

Agree with most everything Ungkor said. Honestly when i look at item upgrades, i don't check AC at all half of the time.

Focus on HP, general covering of your basic focus effects and (especially for higher content) a balanced level of all resists. The vast majority of gear upgrades will give you a steady increase in AC anyway as side-effect.

http://crucible.samanna.net/viewtopic.p ... sc&start=0

The sticky post on shield ac has some good discussion on AC vs HP. There's really 2 parts to the discussion. This is how I understand it and think about it, I am sure others will chime in with their opinions.

First, there is a softcap on AC where returns diminish, going from 990ac to 1000ac is a much bigger gain than going from 1460 to 1470, for example.

Second, there is the point at which your AC overcomes the magic AC number for the mob you are fighting, it's somehow related to atk but I don't know the details. When you reach this point, the mob starts hitting you for minimum damage very often.

Since you play a warrior and AC Is their deal I am sure you understand that part anyways.

I have about 100ac more than you and I am sad to say that mobs in DOD/RSS/etc can still pwn me like a wet napkin if I am unlucky with getting missed. To pickup 100ac to match me, you'd need to drop at least 4-5 aug slots into that, which would be at least 200hp in trade. You're talking about picking up 500ac though, which is no small task, unless you are looking at getting into heavy highend raiding gear (which doesnt look like it from your magelo) you will need to devote all aug slots to AC. If you were a raiding shaman and could actually get your AC up to 2200+ where it would actually make a difference against mobs in places like RSS/DOD etc, then maybe you would want to weigh the AC portion more heavily than you do now.

So, to answer your question directly, I'd take a 25ac aug over a 50hp aug only for my shield slot only. Sadly I think there may only be one such aug in game that is usable by shamans. In any other slot, I would not personally use AC at this time. In terms of gear, I weigh it by the piece. I personally go for the combinations that will maximize my focus effects, HP, other effects, resists, mana and then still keep my AC at or around 1600. If it drops below to 1580ish..no big deal.

Anyways, just my opinion as someone who has similar stats/gear.

I'm gonna go against the grain here. Bed, if you're a normal shaman who is going to do normal shaman stuff, then yes, worry about HP before even considering AC augs (except for the AC aug in the shield). However, if you're going to remotely be a tanking shammy, there is a trade off point where an extra 500 HP isnt as important as that extra 250 AC. When you're getting smacked for 800+ doubles and triples, that HP is pretty much negated if you're already 10-11k+ HP, compared to the amount of damage reduced from increased mitigation due to higher AC.

Shaman are in that gray area where one could lean heavily in one direction just enough to make an effective dent in that direction.

What I'm trying to say, and what I am personally working on, is after about a solid 10.5 k HP and 1800+ AC, for the tanking shammy it's a good time to look into higher AC options. Mostly this will mean trying to get better gear, which also equates to better HP. But so far, the trend I've noticed with much of the commonly had DOD gear is that it is low in the AC dept, while high in the HP department. If you're a conspiratist, it almost like saying SOE has decided to subtly nerf shaman tanking by luring them with high HP/mana items while sneakily lowering their AC gained from these items. Time gear, on the other hand, has very solid AC, as well as good focus gear. Sticking HP augs into Time gear and using these over uber-HP DOD gear with HP augs will net you higher AC and decent HP. You might lose a total of 300 HP , but you could gain +150 AC or so, making you much more stable as a tank.

Trading out 300 HP for 150 AC seems like a 1 AC = 2 HP ratio, but it is better than that. You will have much more stability with the higher AC, as can be seen if you ever tanked and switched out your gear, fighting a mob that is shammy-tankable yet challenging. Put it this way -- an 11k HP shammy with 1700 AC is much harder to heal than a 10k HP shammy with 1800 AC... which leads you to think in 1:10 ratios, but it doesn't work like that. After you pass 10k HP, and are tanking mobs that could do 3-4k damage versus 4-5k damage per round, you're not looking at the shammy's/tank's total HP as the critical factor, you're looking at how much mitigation is happening. More AC means more mitigation.

Given all this speculation based on actual shammy tanking, if you want to be a ShammyKnight and be delegated as a raid off-tank or tank RSS mobs like more than a couple shammies here do, here's the bottom line:

Get yourself up to 10k+ HP-wise, but aim for 1900+ buffed AC (dont' forget Tribute AC). 12k/1800 is WORSE than 10.5k/2000 AC. HP never ever hurt a shaman, but if you tank, more AC means less hurt for that shaman.

I've got flameshield stones on both my bracers. I'm using 40hp augs still on my BP/Pants, I'd probably slap flameshield stones in each of them, too.

Would I drop one for a 90hp aug? probably. But I have slots that have other augs I could upgrade which are less valuable than 25ac.

AC Buffs add to the softcap, not the hardcap I believe. AC buffs are great. I use the old Jaundiced Bone Breastplate, get the cleric AC buff and the ranger AC buff on raids. It makes a difference

It was a comment made by one of the devs, a while back, that AC buffs are equally effective whatever your AC is, which I interpreted meant that it added as under softcap AC

I'm wondering. I realize that warriors, melees, hybrids, and shaman are all on different mitigation tables.

And discounting reduced/increased damage taken due to ripostes, blocks, and dodges...

Will a 12k/2k shammy tank take the same damage as a 12k/2k ranger tank, or a 12k/2k warrior tank?

Another way to put the question is this --

After calculating a class' AC softcap and returns, mitigation and avoidance formulas, a single composite AC number is displayed. Does that displayed AC effectively reduce the mob's DI the same irregardless if it is a 2kAC shammy tank rather than a 2kAC warrior tank?