Answers from the afterlife
Read the initial Raidbots Shadowlands announcements.
How accurate is Raidbots/SimulationCraft for Shadowlands?
Most DPS specs are pretty stable now and most gear is implemented so results shouldn’t be too out-of-whack. Class Discord and website will likely have pins/macros/articles on any trinkets/abilities that might be over- or under-simming. Those will be your best bet for finding and avoiding any sim bait.
As always, sims are just one tool in the toolbox so check with guides, theorycrafters, class Discords/websites, logs, and your own experience to generate your own conclusions.
Are the Dec 15th Class changes in place?
Yes, Raidbots has updated both the Nightly and Weekly SimC versions that contain the Dec 15th changes.
More changes might pop and will be applied as quick as possible. The Raidbots Discord or Raidbots Twitter may have more up-to-date information.
How can I sim my items from the Great Vault (the Shadowlands weekly chest)?
Top Gear + the SimulationCraft addon have full support for the Great Vault.
Weapon tokens from the raid will be “expanded” into all of the weapons you could buy. Currently only Venthyr weapons are implemented.
- Open your vault in-game — this will generate your options
- Run /simc in-game — this will include Great Vault items in the copypasta
- Paste your input into Top Gear
- Select the Great Vaults items you want to test (purple “GV” badge in the corner)
- Run the sim and make your choice
Top Gear automatically creates combinations that only include 1 Great Vault item at a time — this means you can just select the items that might be an upgrade, run them all, and see what sims the strongest.
Why don’t I see my Covenant/Soulbind abilities in my sim? Why are sims from the Discord bot simming lower than sims on the site?
As of Dec 15th, most Armory lookups on the website and the Discord bot should properly sim your covenant and soulbind. In some cases your character data may be out-of-date — you should try logging into the game as the character without data and then logging out. That should force an update with the correct data.
I just hit level 60, why don’t I see any Covenants/Soulbinds on Top Gear?
The Soulbind UI only activates once you have chosen a Covenant. I do not condone using Raidbots to test or determine Covenants/Soulbinds as a fresh level 60. Use other resources to make that decision.
How can I compare different Covenants?
Click the “Unlock All Soulbinds” checkbox and that will allow you to see all soulbinds for all covenants.
How can I compare different Conduits?
The Soulbinds UI will allow you to test conduits you have unlocked, just make sure to have some conduit sockets chosen in your soulbind. You can enable “Unlock All Conduits” to change conduit item level higher to see how much that will change things.
Generally speaking, conduit item level upgrades lead to pretty marginal differences so you want the highest possible but it generally won’t make or break anything.
How can I compare Legendaries I haven’t unlocked?
There are two ways to sim legendaries.
Top Gear has the “Runecarver Legendaries” section at the top that can automatically create fake Legendary items that you can test.
You can also use Gear Compare — search for the base item from crafting and then you can choose from the available powers and secondary stats.
You cannot currently search based on the final name of the item. I’m looking into supporting this in Gear Compare but it’s tricky.
How can I compare weapon oils/stones?
Open up “Simulation Options” and you can tweak the “Weapon Oil” setting. this will apply to all results in a single sim — the easiest way to compare oils right now is run a series of Quick Sims, each with a different oil/stone chosen.
Warning: Raidbots isn’t super smart right now and choosing “Both hands” will apply oils to shields/frills which cannot actually be enchanted.
How can I adjust settings for <external buff> or <funky item>?
Many items, soulbind traits, and other buffs have options that can be set in the “Custom APL and SimC Options” section or in Advanced mode.
The SimC wiki has documentation for most of these:
- Options for various 9.0 soulbinds and items
- External buffs (PI, focus magic)
- Specific classes also have various settings, e.g. Focus Magic info for Mages
Some of these may eventually become fancy options directly in the Raidbots “Simulation Options” section but until then, you can use the text version at any time.
