Keeping Up with Specs - TalentChic and GlyphChic
Posted by 
pixiestixy on Tuesday, April 28, 2009 - 10 Comments Tags: 3.1, 3.1.1, GlyphChic, Patch, TalentChic, builds, content patch, dual spec, glyphs, respec, spec, talent trees, talents
pixiestixy on Tuesday, April 28, 2009 - 10 Comments Tags: 3.1, 3.1.1, GlyphChic, Patch, TalentChic, builds, content patch, dual spec, glyphs, respec, spec, talent trees, talents 
The smoke is starting to clear from all the changes in patches 3.1 and 3.1.1, and players are figuring out how all the class changes have affected preferred talent specs and accompanying glyphs. Also, with the recent addition of dual spec, there are a lot of players out there who've recently been looking into the best builds for different aspects of gameplay. So there was plenty to consider with the patches, and thankfully we have a lot of tools out there for figuring out which builds we like best.When I was trying to figure out how to spec for my foray in the arena tournament, I used the WoWWiki page for rogue builds, found the PvP spec I liked best, then figured out how to gear up based on my new talents. But there are downsides to that route - posters don't always have the best insight into which builds are best, and there's a whole array to choose from, each with slightly different tweaks. Now I'm all for personalizing your character based on your own preferences and playing style. But when thinking about completely switching your specs (or adding a dual spec), sometimes it's good to go for the tried and true specs to start off with, then figure out what changes you want to make from there. I think the best tool out there for this is TalentChic.com, and the recently added sister site, GlyphChic. Here's how it works:
"To find the most popular talent builds, the system scans both the US and EU WoW armory sites to find the talent points chosen by characters. It then sorts those according class, spec and playstyle and collates the results...
We continually scan the armory and update the popularity score of the most popular builds hourly. "
Just by looking at the TalentChic home page, we can see that the overall most popular builds among "the best players" who are included in the calculation are:
- Elemental Shaman 57/14/0
- Restoration Shaman 0/16/55
- Fire Mage 0/53/18
- Combat Rogue 15/51/5 (And coincidentally, also the spec I'm working my main toward)
- Shadow Priest 13/0/58
But the interesting part is when you use the site's filters to break down the popularity of a build according to class and find out specifics. As of my writing this, the top 10 most popular Death Knight builds are either Frost or Unholy, with Blood only making the list at number 11. You also can sort the list according to specific talent trees. The top four builds for hunters, for example, are minor variations on a survival spec. But you also can look specifically at the beast mastery tree to see that among those specs, several different versions of a 53/11/7 build are the most prominent. And if you want to watch and see how any patch changes affect the popularity of builds, you can sign up to get updates when a specific page on the site changes. Currently, the site is updated based on how players have rebuilt their specs that were reset with patch 3.1 and again with 3.1.1.
The sister web site, GlyphChic, operates very similarly. You choose your specific considerations, and the site reguritates useful stats back at you. Among players who also use my favored combat spec, for example, the most popular major glyphs are of sinister strike, rupture and slice and dice, while the favored minor glyphs are of blurred speed, vanish and safe fall.
The site's been around since the talent respec that came with 3.0.2, and the WoW community continues to be a little smarter because of it. So for anyone who hasn't checked it out yet or who hasn't been back since last Tuesday, definitely take a look. You may find yourself surprised, entertained or at least more informed.
Reader Comments (10)
well im having trouble with my DK. ive been a frost tank since the realease of WOTK. but since 3.1 frost had some renovations, now im completly lost as to how im goin to respec.
It never ceases to amaze me the info I get from you all. Thanks for the links.
Now all I have to do is input the dam talents again after this bloody patch.
Awesome, thanks for the sites. Its really nice to be able to check out the specs of all classes.
Looking at the shadow spec made me lol. When it comes right down to it if you want to be a PvE shadow priest almost the entire tree is vital and those 13 points in discipline are a given, which leaves us with 2 spare points that either go into Improved Shadowform (for that little bit moer dps overall IF you get hit) or Improved Vampiric Embrace (to take a little of the load off the healers). I personally went for Improved Vampiric Embrace as every little helps, and I feel overall that little bit extra raid healing will be used more than me being able to cast better while getting hit. If the opposite proves to be true then I'll consider changing, but for now I like my purple spec just the way i like it.
I prefer to take my own trials and errors into account when speccing. It helps me learn on the way.l
And TBH, those Arms spec. well, Rofl.
It's really nice to be able to see the cookie cutter talent specs (especially for the players who may not be as savvy on the abilities and talents that were changed in their class and how it affects their dps/tanking/healing) websites like talentchic and wowwikki are a nice place to get the info quick and easy for talents and glyphs.
Still, just remember that doing your own experimenting can go quite far for finding a good talent spec (along with doing the research)
great post :)
I have a Hunter almost lvl 40 now and I'm having trouble deciding what way to go. I know Beast mastery is suppose to be the best for DPS and I want to Spec for DPS but i also want to be able to do lots of damage myself without having to rely on my pet?
any help on this would be great and I'm hoping once i get enough gold the duel spec will help me out
for jarno.
i got a hunter myself and also like the dps my pet does at BM but when i did some raids in naxx and stuff my pet kinda died alot and keeping it alive just cost to much mana. so for raids i really use survival so i can ignore my pet and just focus on myself ( cant even do that right sometimes XD ) and survival is nice for pvp too so you dont really need dual spec and its better to use that money for an alt. ofc there are some differences in survival pve and pvp but those are small so i dont care
hope you can do something with this and if anybody knows better pls do so beacuse i need to learn to
and very nice post sure gonna give that talentchic a try
I agree with all that rhy said in response to jarno. I play a level 80 hunter, and spec SV for raids and PVE, and most of the time PVP.
But as your level 40 Jarno, i would say use BM as your main spec for now, use up all talent points in BM tree, except save up 10 mortal and lethal shots as they help your dps alot.
But BM for getting those levels up is probably the best to go for. And I would say for PVP , hmm since there wasnt duel spec when i was level 40, i cant advise, BM does do damage, and is good in PVP it was at level 40, so I would say go for that, still. Although try out SV if you want to get used to it, for it will most probably be the main spec to be when you hit 80 :)
Hope that helped somewhat :)
It does not follow that because we do not subsidize smoking, we should not regulate unhealthy activities. Costs and savings are not the only variable. The fact that obesity creates costs is merely an additional reason to regulate it, not the only one. The main reason is its danger to an individual. You are dismissive of subsidizing smoking precisely because of this moral intuition. uzxbno uzxbno - Moncler Jakke Dame.