False Dichotomies

I read a backgammon strategy book a while ago where the author made the case that decent backgammon players make mistakes not because they can't properly choose the best move between their options but because they fail to even consider the best move at all. The problem being that they find two moves that look good, work out which one is the better between the two, and go with it. The problem, obviously, is that there's way more than 2 different moves in almost every backgammon position and you're giving up little edges every time you don't consider all the good moves.

This flaw exists in more than just backgammon. It's human nature to fall for this logical fallacy, and I believe I've fallen for it in terms of how I gear my Death Knight for tanking. Some background:

There's currently a stat in World of Warcraft called expertise. This stat reduces the chance a mob has of dodging or parrying your attacks. Having my autoattacks get dodged or parried costs me damage and threat. Having my specials get dodges or parried costs me time and possible damage, threat, and healing. I don't like any of those things, so it seems like I want expertise.

Unfortunately right now there is exactly one tanking piece at top level for me with expertise on it. On top of that I get to use a 2-handed weapon, which can also have a lot of expertise on it. That item is pants, and there is another great set of pants with a lot of armor on it.

When I first looked into this situation a couple months ago it looked like I had two options. Either I could wear the pants with expertise and give up on the armor pants or I could wear the armor pants and give up on the expertise. I won't say I had threat problems persay but I was definitely skirting the line so I decided to stick with my expertise pants.

The problem, of course, is that those aren't my only two options at all. Another option (the reason I'm making this post) is I could just gem expertise instead of stamina in a couple sockets to make up the difference. I need to look into exactly what I'd be giving up to do it, but it is certainly something I should have looked at in the first place. A fourth option which I hadn't even thought of until right now is switching in an expertise trinket, or enchants. In all of these cases I need to decide between threat and survivability but I should look at what I'm giving up in each case instead of just ignoring their existance.

Which takes us back to the false dichotomy. I didn't say to myself "Hey, socketing expertise isn't a good choice for reasons X and Y." No, I just didn't think of it at all. I got sucked into choosing between A and B and forgot to even look for C.

Right now the only fight that matters to me is a fight where I am dying a lot and where my threat is largely irrelevant. My gut feeling now is to just switch pants and screw expertise entirely but I want to see what the costs are this time around to make that decision!

So, my options are:

A) Status Quo: Wear Sanctified Scourgelord Legguards. 2310 ac, 123 str, 273 sta, 118 def, 92 dodge, 82 expertise
B) Just Pillars of Might: 3500 ac, 162 str, 279 sta, 10 def, 79 dodge, 77 parry

Switching to B from A gains 1190 ac, 39 str, 6 sta, 77 parry at the cost of -108 def, -13 dodge, -82 expertise.

I remain uncrittable without the defense, so I’m fine there.

C) I currently have 6 red sockets filled with purple gems at the moment. As such, it’s pretty easy to make up 60 of the expertise by switching those from dodge/sta gems to expertise/sta gems. Beyond that, I can give up 30 stamina to get the remaining 20 expertise I’m losing.
D) Enchant gloves: Expertise gives me 15 expertise at the cost of 10 parry and 2% threat. The expertise won’t make up that threat difference, so this is terrible.
E) Enchant bracers: Expertise gives 15 expertise at the cost of 40 stamina. This is a worse ratio than changing my gems, so this is also terrible.
F) Put on Victor’s Call. It is 83 expertise and costs me 228 stamina.

Now, my slightly outdated stat valuation for ac puts 18 bonus ac as worth the same as 1 stamina. So picking up 1190 extra ac is worth 66 stamina, so giving up 30 stamina to get there is good. Giving up 228 stamina to get there is not. Option F is therefore terrible.

I also don’t need to get all the way to the first expertise cap. It’s certainly good to get there (worth trading dodge for, for example) but may not be worth giving up stamina for. Especially given my current role on Lich King hard I think giving up dodge is fine but giving up stamina is not. So, assuming I switch purple gems all around my overall change by switching legs is:
1190 ac, 39 str, 6 sta, 77 parry at the cost of -108 def, -73 dodge, -22 expertise.

The parry and dodge about cancel each other out so I’m giving up 108 defense for 1190 ac and 39 strength. This is actually pretty close, since the 108 defense has very real value in terms of avoidance. In fact, my old values slot 108 defense as being worth 1166 ac. So making the swap is a marginal gain there, but it`s not the end of the world if I stick with my current setup.

I think I’m going to make the switch. It’s not a big gain but it is a gain. I also don`t have the T10.5 pants yet, just the T10 ones, so it is a big upgrade until I would get a 5th token.