Talisman of Resurgence and Skinning Cats

I want to apologize up front about the ranting nature of this post. My intent is not to offend anyone but I am sure that a few of my readers will see themselves in this post. I am making this post to get it off my chest as well as to educate, because I literally cannot take it anymore. The good news is that what I have to say is fairly simple.

The Talisman of Resurgence is NOT a DPS trinket!!!

If you you are a moonkin who uses this trinket as a part of your Moonkin set, then the next time you have some free time your first priority should be to replace this piece of junk. The good news is it is fairly easy to replace. Here is why you want to.

The Math:

I suspect that most people pick up the [Talisman of Resurgence] because it is purchasable with Emblems of Triumph. The funny thing is, you can pick up the [Sundial of the Exiled] with Emblems of Heroism and it is a better DPS trinket. Let me compare the two.

Proc vs Proc:

ToR: Use: Increases spell power by 599 for 20 sec. (2 minute Cooldown)

SotE: Equip: Your harmful spells have a chance to increase your spell power by 590 for 10 sec. (10% proc chance and 45 sec cooldown)

For the Talisman of Resurgence the math is fairly simple. If you assume that you pop the trinket on cooldown then then the proc is equivalent to 99.8 Spell power (599*(20/120) = 99.8). For the Sundial of the Exiled the math is a little more complicated. Since it is an on equip bonus we have to make some assumptions. With a 10% proc chance on average it will take about 10 casts to proc the buff. Also, most raiding moonkin should have a Wrath cast time of 1 second and a Starfall cast time of around 2 seconds, lets assume cast time for all spells of about 1.5 seconds. This means the sundial should proc about once a minute. Therefore, on average the sundial proc is worth 98.3 spell power (590*(10/60) = 98.3). If you want to assume that it procs once ever 70 seconds then the value drops to 84.3 spell power.

As you can see, in the proc department the Talisman of Resurgence has a slight advantage, and also has the benefit of being an on use and therefore less likely to be wasted. However, the advantage is slight. I wouldn't estimate it over 15 spell power.

Stat's vs Stats:

Most moonkin, have a pretty good idea of what 84 Crit rating is worth, but many get confused by the Int. We know it provides some crit and some spell power. It also has mana regen benefits but am going to ignore those because most people don't have mana issues.

The first thing to remember about Int is that it is modified by Blessing of Kings, Furor, and Improved Mark of the Wild. So, the 128 Int on the trinket is actually 158 Int in a raid situation (128 * 1.1*1.1*1.02 = 158). In terms of Crit Rating, 158 Int is worth 43.5 Crit Rating (158/166.66 = 43.5). In terms of Spell Power it is worth 19 spell power (158*0.12 = 19).

So, if you compare 43.5 Crit Rating and 19 Spell power to 84 Crit Rating it is clear that the 84 Crit Rating provided by the Sundial is clearly better then 128 Int. Since the two procs provided by the trinkets are fairly equal, then the Sundial of the Exile is clearly better because of the superior stats. Even if you value sundial with a lower uptime the two trinkets come out roughly equal.

Skinning Cats:

Some of you may be thinking, "What's the big deal? The difference between the two trinkets very small." As one forum poster put it, there is more then one way to skin a cat. I agree. The difference is small and there is more then one way to skin a cat, but just because there is more then one way doesn't mean all of those ways are equal. For example, would you rather skin the cat with a skinning knife or a machete?

The fact of the matter is there are always a bad options, good options, and the best option.

In the end I suspect that a lot of people use the Talisman because it has a high ilevel and increases gear score more then the other options. I can understand how that is tempting when dumb dumbs based pug spots purely on a number that they don't understand. That said, I would rather be excluded from a group because I geared correctly then make gearing mistakes to impress a random pug leader.

About the Blog: You may have noticed that frequency of my posts has dropped. I apologize for that. My life outside of WoW has gotten very busy over the past couple of months and unfortunately the blog has been the one to suffer. Please know that I am not planning on dropping the blog. My posts may be less frequent but I do plan to continue making them.

About My Guild: We are still recruiting. We are a serious progression guild with a relatively light schedule. We accomplish more in 9 hours a week then most guilds do in 15 or 20. For more information please send me an email or check out the website here.