Faking It and Glove Quandry

Last night I picked up the last of the MH rep JC patterns. What this means is even though I'm most likely the worst 375 JC you've ever had the chance to meet, it doesn't matter because all my guildies want are the rep patterns for the epic gems. The "guild JC'er" and I are closer to equals than we ever have been before, even though he spent tons of gold buying patterns off the AH and grinding all that rep. Granted, we have been passing epic drop patterns to him, but those are few and far between. I think in the end, it's a bit of relief for him. I was able to help with the onslaught of people bearing gems last night when the officers decided it was open season on the ones we've been storing in the bank. I've never seen so many happy caster dps people in all my life. Previously gems had been restricted to slot color matching. It feels good to be useful.

Speaking of gems, I picked up the T6 gloves last night. I'm one of those people that likes matching and love collecting sets of gear. My priest still has like 3 pieces of T0 in her bank, just in case I manage to get the rest someday. So when I got the chance for another piece of T6, I didn't bat an eye. And maybe I should have... After suiciding off the MH hill, I picked the gloves up from the foyer vendor. And realized I was loosing 22 crit for 4 stam, 4 int, 20 healing, and 5mp5. (Using [Royal Shadowsong Amethyst]) I already run low on the spectrum of crit pallies at about 23.7%. Loosing that crit drops me by 1%.

So I was hoping that maybe the full set of T6 would compensate. It seems to come close if I use a +8 crit [Gleaming Dawnstone] for one of the yellow slots. The rest of the gems would be [Luminous Pyrestone]x2, [Royal Shadowsong Amethyst]x4, [Kailee's Rose], [Blood of Amber], and [Bracing Earthstorm Diamond]. The net result is +24 stam, +20 int, +87 healing, -1 crit, and +17 mp5 from my currently gemmed T5 set to my proposedly gemmed T6 set. I am a bit ill over having to use Kailee's Rose to maintain my meta gem, though. I'm already a bit extreme on the +healing, a condition left over from being a priest. If I swap to [Insightful Earthstorm Diamond] then I can get a net positive +24 stam, +32 int, +50 healing, -1 crit, and 19mp5. That's either about +16 hp more healed per Flash (with Bracing) or the mana for 2 extra Flashes in a 15 min fight (with Insightful).

Doing the math from there based on my WWS for a 15 min fight, it's basically a wash bewtween the two until you look at the Insigtful meta gem proc. According to WoWHead comments, paladins can see around a 10% proc rate, or 45mp5 over the duration of a long fight. That jumps the 2 extra Flashes to 47 in a 15 min fight, which is a ton more hp healed.

Reading EJ right now, I might have some hope on the crit front. They note 18% crit as the number they shoot for. While that does seem kind of low to me, maybe the situation isn't as bad as I thought. Sadly, they did spell out that the T6 gloves suck (b/c of only 2 crit) and recommend the S3 gloves instead. /sigh Comparing the S3 to the T5, I'll get +13 stam, +4 int, -7 healing, +4 crit, and -9 mp5. The trick, though, is the on equip: +2% crit for Flash. I don't mind loosing the healing (have +2.1k atm), but 9mp5 for 2.36% on Flashes... Moar math. /brain explody

As EJ also points out, if you're mostly in the tank group (a la no SP), mp5 can be more helpful than crit. I'm always in the tank group. Always. T6 gives me 5mp5 over T5 and switching metas will give me even more. So maybe the gloves will work out once I get more T6. Sadly I just put a shiny new Bracing in my T6 helm, a gem my husband farmed the mats for. He's is gonna kill me for not doing this analysis earlier...