Stat comparison Among the most interesting decisions to make in " World of Warcraft " are those concerning gear . Should a warrior prefer + Stamina or + Dodge % ? Is + heal better or mana / 5 ? Of course there can be no " right " answers to such questions . It ' s always a matter of " it depends . . . " , but sometimes reasonable upper and lower limits can be found ( e . g . 5 mana / 5 will for all casters always be better than 10 spi ) . Another helpful insight is the Item level article , just to see which relative values Blizz ard gives to different stats . Healer mana . There are many aspects to the problem how to optimize a healers endurance . Let us look at the various item stats which can affect healer mana and / or efficiency . Intellect . Int simply increases the mana pool and spell crit chance . It is the benchmark for the other stats . Update : Intellect now increases the amount of mana regenerated per point of spirit by a sqrt relationship . Spirit . When considering spi , it is important to understand how mana regeneration works ( see 5 second rule ) . Mods exist which collect the data on how much time is spent inside the 5 second rule , and how much mana each point of spirit regenerated ( as shown by RatingBuster AddOn ) . For " average " combats it ' s safe to assume that 1 spi = 1 int . Mana / 5 . At first glance , mana / 5 is quite similar to spi — it regenerates mana . In combat though , mana / 5 is usually " better " , as a rule of thumb a factor of 3 can be assumed ( 1 mana / 5 = 3 spi ) + Heal . Comparing + heal to the other stats is a little tricky . It is necessary to consider current mana efficiency ( HP / mana and HP / time ) and its change due to + heal . For any given combat thus the saved amount of mana can be found . The effect of additional + heal becomes less after a certain point , because increasing an already high efficiency yields less of an effect than increasing a low efficiency . The various sources agree that a factor of about 8 is appropriate to convert + heal to mana / 5 ( 1 mana / 5 = + 8 heal ) . Spell crit % . Similar to + heal , this increases efficiency ( with the added problem that crits may easily result in overheal ) . One percent crit in theory increases total HP healed by 0 . 5 % , which in turn could be translated to an increase of the available mana by the same amount . Summary . Reducing all stats to Int leads to the following : In longer fights , + heal and mana / 5 become more important when grinding spi and int are preferable . For PvP , Int is probably the most important stat because PvP encounters tend to be short but intense , and the increased critrate is important there too . A very thorough discussion can be found at WoWHealers ( see external links section for link ) . Caster DPS Equivalence . The equivalence between damage stats for casters is greatly simplified by using the following general damage formula : Where . . . Some notes : Marginal Benefit of Stats . To compute the equivalence between stats , it ' s convenient to figure out just how much damage is gained by increasing stats . Once this is done , the gains can be set equal and solved for one stat or the other . In short , it ' s easiest to calculate how much damage or DPS is added by + damage , + spell crit , + spell hit , and so on , as these values can then be compared to figure out how much of one stat is equivalent to another . Given the expected damage / cast formula above , the following expressions can be derived : Where " ∆E " represents the change in " E " ( the change in expected or average damage / cast ) , " ∆d " the change in + damage , and so on . With the marginal benefits calculated above , stat equivalence can now be computed . Example : Spell Damage and Spell Crit . This example how equivalences in general are calculated , using the particular case of spell damage versus spell crit . For adding " ∆d " + damage to be considered equivalent to " ∆c " crit chance , the benefit ( " ∆E " ) of both must be equal . Thus , their individual expressions for " ∆E " can be set equal . That is . . . Which is equivalent to . . . From here , one can solve for either " ∆d " ( which would tell you how much + damage " ∆c " crit chance is worth ) or " ∆c " ( which would tell you how much crit chance " ∆d " + damage is worth ) . These expressions would look like . . . From these expressions , some generalizations can be made . First , the value of + damage in terms of crit decreases as you add more + damage ; conversely , the value of + crit in terms of + damage decreases as you add more + crit . Thus , there is not so much a breakeven " point " so much as there is a breakeven " line . " It is , however , convenient to look at the value of 1 + damage in terms of crit , or 1 crit rating in terms of + damage . Given expression ( 1 ) above and substituting " ∆c " = 1 / 4592 ( the value of 1 crit rating ) , the result is . . . Or , given expression ( 2 ) above and substituting " ∆d " = 1 , the result is . . . General Stat Equivalences . The following formulas result from the same methodology applied to four primary stats - - + damage , + spell crit , + spell hit , and + spell haste . In order to accommodate spell haste , consider an expected DPS function " D " : Where . . . The method continues as before , however , yielding the following results . These formulas allow for some blanket conclusions : Spell damage vs Spell crit . The following reasoning will focus on DPS alone . Taking other factors ( like proc s off crits ) into consideration would be possible , but since there are many such effects , and they are very dependent on class abilities and talents , they will be ignored here . Additionally , spell crits are assumed to increase damage by 100 % ( not by the normal 50 % , but classes interested in this discussion should have taken their talent ) . The following abbreviations will be used : pdmg and crat are basically multiplied to yield final DPS . Contrary to popular belief , pdmg does * not * really result in a " linear " DPS increase , it ' s rather just another factor in the product . In principle it ' s ( bdps + pdmg ) * crat = final DPS , which means that the pdmg is also multiplied by crat . If we want a product to become as large as possible , but the sum of the factors needs to be constant , it ' s best if the two factors are equal . Thus in theory , both factors should be increased in parallel . Assuming a crat of 0 , one point of crat increases total DPS by 1 / 2100 of bdps ( this equals 0 . 048 % ) , and one point of pdmg results in an increase of bdps by 1 / 3 . 5 = 0 . 286 . If we want the two to be equal , we need to do the following calculation : So at 0 % crit chance , we need 600 DPS base damage before crat starts to produce more DPS than pdmg . If we do have some prior crat , the above calculation becomes : This means that for each point of crat we already have , we need 0 . 286 more DPS in order to make crat and pdmg equal . These 0 . 286 DPS are exactly what one pdmg yields . In other words , for each point of crat , we also need a point of pdmg to make it viable ( and vice versa ) . The optimal compromise is to have enough + damage gear to bring base DPS to 600 , and from this point on an equal amounts of crit rating and plus damage . In effect this means that + damage will usually result in a higher DPS increase than + crit ( especially considering that Blizz values + damage lower than + crit rate , see Item level , spell damage is at 0 . 85 and crit rate at 1 ) . Spell crit rating is expensive , but the " price " for crit rating decreases as the amount of + damage increases . Examples ( assuming a caster with 320 DPS from his spells prior to adding + damage ) : The first two groups show that even at + 1000 damage and with a rather low crit rating , + damage is still better than + crit rating , although the difference is smaller than at + 500 damage . Break - even ( at 10 % crit ) would occur at 660 base DPS , which would mean + 1190 damage . So while levelling or still wearing blue / green gear , crit rating should not be a sought - after stat ( if interested in a high average DPS output ) . As shown in the lower two groups , + 1500 damage is just enough to compensate a spell crit rating of 25 % ( the exact bep would be at + 1505 damage , but this doesn ' t really matter ) . With even more + damage gear , increasing crit rating will be better than further + damage . At high levels with real endgame gear , crit rate is a much more interesting stat ( again , strictly considering DPS only ) . If we consider that crat is 17 % more expensive than pdmg we get that the break even point is ~ 700 and not 600 and would show that you will mostly never want to go for crit heavy gear unless you have over 1k spelldamage and no critrating , which will never happen . STR vs AGI . When considering the effects of str and agi on pure white DPS , Str increases DPS by a linear amount ( 1 Str yielding about . 14 DPS ) , while Agi increases the chance to crit ( and thus DPS ) by a factor . In practice this means that depending on the current damage output , there ' s an equilibrium point at which the DPS increase from Agi is higher than the increase from Str . In summary however , it is safe to assume that for most melee characters STR adds more DPS than equivalent AGI , because the equilibrium point is at a rather high value . Strength Note that this is strictly melee attack power ; the calculations for ranged attack power ( RAP ) are different . Also note that this is base " white " dps , and does not consider changes to other abilities . Value of Agility Depending on level and class , agility increases white DPS by increasing the chance to critically hit . Additionally , Equilibrium Point . At this DPS point , the DPS gained by 1 STR and 1 AGI are equal . Past this point 1 AGI will always yield more DPS . The formula to find the equilibrium point is : where For the rest of us . . . Consider a level 60 ( or lower ) druid ( not in cat form ) with 10 % crit chance . Until the shown DPS ( what is shown when you hover your mouse over your damage display in the character menu ) is equal to 314 . 16 it is MORE beneficial from a white DPS standpoint to put 1 point into STR than it is to put one point into AGI . After the equilibrium it is always better to put points into AGI . Note however that this will change your critical hit chance , and therefore the equalibrium point . Now consider for a moment that same druid in cat form ( assuming same crit chance ) . Based on the values given in the section for Agility ; For a level 70 paladin or bear druid , with a 20 % crit chance the equalibrium point is 514 . 29 DPS . For a level 70 warrior with 20 % crit chance it is 678 . 86 . Obviously these values are insanely high . IMPORTANT : Remember that this calculation only considers the 100 % increased damage on crit when calculating DPS from agi . In cases in which you gain a secondary advantage from a crit ( such as rogues or feral druids ) this would result in your favoring agility over strength sooner then your calculated equilibrium point ( due to the secondary advantages of the increased crit chance ) . Also when in PVP spike damage is usually considered preferable to sustained damage , as such when choosing PVP gear you may place mildly higher preference on agility for its spike damage from crits , even if it means sacrificing average sustained DPS . Other considerations . Str and Agi both can also help to reduce damage taken . Agi increases the chances to dodge , Str increases the amounts blocked with a shield . Additionally , there are talents like Flurry , Deep Wounds , and Vengeance which can proc off critical hits , and complicate these calculations further . See also . See the for further insights .