Socket Bonuses Part 2

Previously, I posted a fairly detailed writeup of how you can decide wether to go for a socket bonus or not. The system works, but of course a couple of the questions people have distracted me with in the middle of heroic goddamn Anub'arak is, "Is there a way I can just get a list of what's worth it or not?"

Well, here I am, again to the rescue. Note, you're not going to completely escape the math here, but I can pare things down a good deal.
EJ has some simple rules. I like to get involved in my character - doing the work yourself gives you a better understanding of why things do what they do, it's one of the little things that helps separate the really good from the pretty damn good. However, those are both still awful good, so if you do like easy answers, here's the estimates:


A yellow gem costs: 4 spellpower, 6 haste, 7 crit, 8 spirit, or 23 intellect
A blue gem costs: 6 spellpower, 8 haste, 10 crit, or 32 intellect

A socket bonus has to pay for the cost of any non-red gem you need to hit it. You can consider your two blue gems required for the meta to be free, but use them to get the best bonuses you can, the weaker ones have to pay for themselves.

I'm ignoring hit bonuses, here, because as I've often said, you should treat hit as a binary capped/not capped situation, not a sliding scale. If that hit bonus will cap you, get it. If you're capped, obviously never even look at it.

Obviously, I harp on the fact that scale factors are not constants, they shift with the breeze and yours are not the same as mine or EJ's. So obviously, one set of rules won't always be right. However, the hand out rules won't steer you into any truly bad decisions - you might lose some DPS on them, but not a meaningful amount. They will steer you away from the really bad ones, too.

But you want to be Grand Crusader material, not Tribute to Mad Skill material, don't you? Don't you? Shut up, just read the stuff, I had to think about this shit.

Ok, first up, we need to Simcraft up some scale factors, of course. Here's my recent batch:
Spellpower: 1.61
Spirit: 0.62
Crit: 0.9
Haste: 1.00

The cost of a non-red gem is 23-12=11 spellpower minus 10 of the on-color stat. So a blue costs 11*sp-10*spi, and a yellow 11*sp-10*haste.

Red cost: 0 dps
Blue cost: 17.71-6.2=11.51 dps
Yellow cost: 17.71-10=7.71 dps

So, there we have the cost of a socket color, the bonus has to pay the cost or it's not worth getting. On to the examples. I'm actually going to rapid fire burn through all the sockets everywhere on my current gear, just to give plenty of examples.

Head: Kel'Thuzad's Hood of Triumph
Blue socket, 9 spellpower bonus
9 spellpower=14.49 DPS

The cost is paid, the bonus is hit. Note this also accounts for one of the blue sockets required by my meta gem. Keep track of this fact - you might find at least two worth it for the bonus alone, but in case you don't cover both required blue gems, you'll want to look for the least loss to complete your meta gem.

Neck: Pendant of Fiery Havoc
Yellow socket, 5 spellpower bonus
5 sp=8.05 dps

Note that my shoulders, Kel'Thuzad's Shoulderpads of Triumph and my cloak, Shawl of the Refreshing Winds, are the same socket layout as Penant of Fiery Havoc - one yellow socket for 5 spellpower.

In all four cases, of course, the cost is paid and the socket is worth it.

Robe: heroic Flowing Vestments of Ascent
Red/blue/yellow socket, 9 spellpower bonus.
9  spellpower=14.49

This is a special case. Note that 14.49 will not pay for the combined cost of both the blue and yellow socket, but it WILL pay for either alone. This means that if you don't have a profitable place for a meta-required blue gem, this is a good place for one, the net loss for this bonus is 4.73 dps

Bracers: heroic Felspark Bindings
Yellow socket, 4 crit bonus
4 crit=3.6 dps

Not a big surprise here, crit bonuses normally won't pay their bills.

Cord of Biting Cold
Red/blue/prismatic socket, 7 spellpower bonus
7 spellpower=11.27 dps

11.27 doesn't quite cover the 11.51 cost of a blue gem here - note that this one does end up breaking the EJ guidelines - they say 6 spellpower is enough to pay for a blue socket. The margin is tiny, though, this is one that could literally become a profitable bonus for me with my next gear change. This is also a very good place to put a blue gem to finish off my meta, the loss is only 0.24 dps, trivial regardless.

Pants: heroic Kel'Thuzad's Leggings of Triumph
Red/yellow socket, 7 spellpower bonus
7 spellpower=11.27 dps

This time with a yellow socket, 7 spellpower is worth it.

Boots of Fiery Resolution
Red/yellow socket, 6 haste bonus
6 haste=6 dps

Haste bonuses fare better than crit ones, but still, they don't often make the cut. However, ToC and Icecrown are the land of the spellpower bonus, and crit, haste, hit, and especially intellect bonuses are much less prevalent here, so socket bonuses are going to be more and more worth it.

Now, I've gone through all my gear (well, I skipped two items that only had red sockets anyway - their bonuses are free regardless). Remember I told you to keep track of how many blue sockets were worth hitting? We only had one, the one on my head for 9 spellpower. This means I still need one blue gem somewhere, I have two options: My robe and my belt. The robe would require a second gem to complete the bonus and mitigate the dps loss for the blue gem, with a net loss of 4.73 dps. However, my belt's bonus was on the razor's edge of profit as is, with a loss of only 0.24 dps. So the second blue gem goes in the Cord of Biting Cold.


So, there you have it. While this is presented differently, this is basically the same system I've presented before. However, this front loads most of the math into figuring the cost of a gem socket, which makes quick review of your entire setup quite a bit easier.