Dragoons: A Rotation Reborn

Does crafted i110 (2.4) count?

Does Nexus (2.38) count?

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Originally Posted by SunnyHirose

Does crafted i110 count?

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No.i90 crafted like in 2.3.

Gonna go with HA weapon as I already have Zeta.



EDIT: I thought I would need some vitality melds, but it seems like I have enough HP with regular i110 bis + food + party buff.

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Originally Posted by Zankes

No.i90 crafted like in 2.3.

Gonna go with HA weapon as I already have Zeta.



EDIT: I thought I would need some vitality melds, but it seems like I have enough HP with regular i110 bis + food + party buff.

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Vit gear is mostly for casters/healers, but you still want VIT gear since the dps loss is minimal with good melds and the VIT buffer is pretty helpful in the mechanic/heavy raid damage style fights that are savage - specifically Vit gear can make T6 significantly easier (let's you brute force certain mechanics), and is very helpful avoiding deaths in heavensfall phase in T9. None of the savage fights have a hard dps check especially if you are in 110 bis, prioritising mechanics/survival is probably the smartest way to play.

Okay. So, VIT. VIT makes "BiS" pretty up in the air.

T6-T8 savage, VIT melds are nice in many cases but most definitely not necessary if you are at no-crafted i110 BiS (I can say this about 6 and 7 authoritatively, which I attempted at less than i110 BiS and before the DRG buff... though we didn't get 7 down before 2.4 :(. 8 I'm just basing that off other groups' videos). T9 front BiS will suffice for these turns, even though it's not really the nicest thing to do to your healers. This is that BiS, with 2.45 changes accounted for. Stat weights for this set:

WD 8.728
STR 1.000
DET 0.322
CRT 0.201
SS 0.156

For 6-8, I'd be more inclined to use the Keeper's Hymn for VIT on melee DPS until everyone knows what's up. That's just me, personally; if you'd been competing for a first the melds would be clearly superior, but even a certain FC famous for using melds effectively didn't have them on some people in some turns.

T9 savage, you could say the same thing, really (at least, I've heard it said). But I'd recommend more HP there, just because there are more moments than in, say, 6 savage where your healers might be a little more distracted with saving their own hides and forget that you're the most important person in the raid. I would advise at least a single melded accessory (if you can't decide what: ring is the most flexible option). Two is nice, but you already have DRG HP and you already don't have the loltastic MDEF.

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Originally Posted by Dervy

HT - (IR + PS) - ID - (X-POT) - DI - (Delayed BFB) - CT - (JUMP) - PH - (LegS) - TT - (SSD) - VP - (LS) - FT (DFD).

If you cannot get 9GDCs in a Blood for Blood, then you need to use it before Impulse Drive, so it would be something like:

HT - (BFB) - ID - (X-POT) - DI - (IR + PS) - CT - (JUMP) - PH - (LegS) - TT - (SSD) - VP - (LS) - FT (DFD) = Or switch the X-POT around with the IR + PS.

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Thank you! I'll put these two in test and see if I can pull off the 9 GCDs during the BFB! IR and PS are definitely something I can pull off together without it clipping to the next GCD. Once I get my muscle memory to work with one of these it's time to start pushing to new levels!

I used to have a paid subscriptions of WTFast while back, stopped using it as I didn't see a huge improvement and couldn't justify paying for it, but I am going to pick it up and test out now that it's free trial without cutting off every 20 minutes.

Hi just giving some pointers out for opening rotation to help out that burst opening.

Power surge, HT,IR,ID,B4B,DIS,JUMP,CT,Leg sweep,phil,Dragon fire dive, TT, spine jump,VT, LS, FT, HT.

You don't want to hold your dragon fire dive towards the end of your combo due to cool the cool down timer. The person who is using dragon fire dive first is usually the one who gets one extra dragon jump in before a phase change. You want that move on CD at all times.

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Originally Posted by Sleigh

I've never seen a DRG (without a NIN) who had to LB do above 500 on T13. Between LB, Earthshakers in final phase, and the massive amount of downtime, sounds hard. On the other hand I've seen BRD and BLM do 510, with room for improvement if they were in lower DPS groups where they got to attack more of the adds.

I could see it in mid-level DPS groups only. I'd be keen on seeing other high DPS group's DRG's numbers in each turns, with sub-6m T10, 11, sub-7m T12, and sub 11m T13 though - I did see a DRG do 600 T10 but I think that was with Doomspikes and the AoE strat.

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alright you don't really lose that much dps with final phase earthshakers. If blms and bards are doing more dps, then it means that they are doing most of it during the add phase and therefore is taking it from your other dps. I did more than 500 on t13 this week without a ninja and lbing but that's with 7 people, so once again, more damage during adds.

I mean Dragoon is pretty close if not the same as monk/ninja and would be more dps with +8.5% for bards. If your dragoon is losing to blms and bards then he's doing something wrong. It should really only be possible in t13 due to aoeing adds.

I was top dps in my first clear before the buffs.

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Originally Posted by rickyguo

alright you don't really lose that much dps with final phase earthshakers. If blms and bards are doing more dps, then it means that they are doing most of it during the add phase and therefore is taking it from your other dps. I did more than 500 on t13 this week without a ninja and lbing but that's with 7 people, so once again, more damage during adds.

I mean Dragoon is pretty close if not the same as monk/ninja and would be more dps with +8.5% for bards. If your dragoon is losing to blms and bards then he's doing something wrong. It should really only be possible in t13 due to aoeing adds.

I was top dps in my first clear before the buffs.

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Sure in 7 man, everyone's DPS is gonna be up, more time and AoE opportunity on adds, and a longer fight relative to the mandatory downtime. Much much harder if everyone's on point to do 500 or so, way too much just standing around. If you wanna talk about DPS solely on Bahamut and/or the wyverns that spawn sure DRG is gonna be higher up % wise compared to the whole fight but it's still slightly lowest by a couple thousand damage taken in my sub-11m group, counting the wyverns' damage taken.

Need DRG numbers for T10-13 in a comparable group, 7 mans or regular clear times aren't gonna give a fair comparison. I've yet to see a DRG top most of my group's numbers including BLM/BRD in fast clears but I'm always open to see more groups' numbers!

BLM could absolutely wreck DRG in 2.3-2.4 if they got a lot of Foe Requiem and got to properly milk every last Astral Fire.

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Originally Posted by SunnyHirose

BLM could absolutely wreck DRG in 2.3-2.4 if they got a lot of Foe Requiem and got to properly milk every last Astral Fire.

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Those were dark days for the Dragoon.

I'm not sure what the the discussion re: specific dps numbers is for?
If you are trying to determine who is contributing most dps, you can't really ignore the fact that the BRD gains up to 8% dps from DRG's piercing debuff, which really makes the numbers you are throwing around moot.

Melee are good at single target, additional targets favour range dps with their low ramp up time, mechanics that favour multiple mobs and obviously because they are ranged - hence the shorter fights time more and more skew towards range since more time is spent on multi targets relatively.

There is an argument to be made about DRG AoE when supplied with infinite TP though, it's pretty good, would like to test it if we ran NIN.

I been doing 7mans for the last like 3 months so I can't give you numbers unfortunately.

Maybe kurama can do it.

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Originally Posted by Daweism

Those were dark days for the Dragoon.

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>.>
<.<
I miss those days
>.>

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Originally Posted by enil

I'm not sure what the the discussion re: specific dps numbers is for?
If you are trying to determine who is contributing most dps, you can't really ignore the fact that the BRD gains up to 8% dps from DRG's piercing debuff, which really makes the numbers you are throwing around moot.

Melee are good at single target, additional targets favour range dps with their low ramp up time, mechanics that favour multiple mobs and obviously because they are ranged - hence the shorter fights time more and more skew towards range since more time is spent on multi targets relatively.

There is an argument to be made about DRG AoE when supplied with infinite TP though, it's pretty good, would like to test it if we ran NIN.

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Oh trust me I think DRG is worth the raid slot over MNK in T10-12, and arguably over a second NIN but we don't have a geared second NIN so we don't use it regardless. They are the best LB user, contribute literally 40 DPS or so extra every turn, and their damage is "fine." That said, on an individual level, DRG's gonna be on the lower end due to the LBing and a % of its expected DPS being tied up in BRD DPS (something which bugs me and my raid group, why NIN is doing MNK level DPS while contributing more than 100 extra raid DPS from TA in high DPS groups while DRG does less than MNK DPS and contributes only 30-50 DPS extra ...).

It's just strange to me there's this rebuttal that DRG isn't lowest DPS other than SMN or average BRDs who aren't doing well above 600 on a dummy with Disembowel applied. Would like to see similar situations to my group, that's all.

I mean like I said, if your dragoon is parsing less than your bard and blackmage in t10-t12, then either he is doing something wrong or your bard is refusing to play paeon. He's probably doing less than your ninja or monk because you're making him lb. If he doesn't and he's not bad, he should be similar or identical to both monk and ninja.

This is not counting in the disembowel damage for the bard by the way. Also, on the individual level, LBing isn't forced to be a job of the dragoon. Your ninja can do it. You can also do it as monk without losing GL.

You keep mentioning that your dragoon is doing "less dps than monk" while I simply think your dragoons got issue pressing buttons. Either that or you're like using strategies that are disadvantageous to your melee for some reason.

A dragoon will do more damage than a bard on a a dummy. There is no arguments there, and that's if your bard is playing absolutely 0 paeon, which he will have to play at some point.

Dragoons got more dps right now than monks because they're similar without adjusting for disembowel bard dps. They're probably close to or similar to ninjas once you adjust for TA raid dps, which needs math done but I got doubts that it's 100 raid dps.

Exactly. T10-T12 are essentially Dummy Fights. Melee's rarely do anything, but just DPS a single target. There's very little movement in any of those fights, excluding T12 P4. Even then, you can adjust your raid positioning to make it VERY melee friendly.

Either the strategy handling mechanics is bad, or the Dragoon isn't playing to the best of his ability.

Also, TA is around 2% overall raid DPS. It's a very over-hyped ability.

Rather than just exchange experiences, numbers would help a lot more or we'll just go in circles, since it seems I think BRD and BLM are stronger than you think and you think DRG is stronger than I think.

I will say though that we keep every fight as melee friendly as possible, max uptime, no duties, no fighting adds if it can be helped, and Paeon is played.

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Originally Posted by Dervy

Also, TA is around 2% overall raid DPS. It's a very over-hyped ability.

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It's not overhyped when SCH, WAR, and PLD are doing roughly 400 DPS each before TA, and WHM DPSes the entirety of the first TA. TA ramps up as your group as a whole does more damage, slightly less impressive when you're in a group with standard Shield Oath + Defiance WAR a large portion of the time.

I still highly doubt that it's going to be 100 raid dps.

Why don't you start with how much dps your blm and bard is doing in t10-t13?

My numbers will be skewed as I been doing 7mans as monk for the past months.

The issue is that I do about the same damage on DRG as I do on an equally geared monk. I also do similar numbers to a ninja.

You're basically saying that your BLM and BRD is doing more damage than monks, ninjas and dragoons in basically dummy fights and well, that's on your players pressing buttons.

400 * 1.017 = 406.8 DPS for the Paladin - And even less actually, as afaik there isn't a time where a Ninjitsu perfectly lines up with a TA. Therefore it's not really (1+0.1*10/60), but closer to (1+0.1*10/75). Let's use Lucrezia's parse for example. Overall raid DPS = 3004.03 DPS. http://a.pomf.se/wsakcx.png

3004.03 = 0.983 = 2952.96149. It's 51 overall raid DPS in this situation with TA, approximately.

And here's some videos of really good Dragoon runs:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqrmKqLGavI (Multiply those numbers by 0.983)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8-4GspLO2Y (And Aikaal is a monstrous BLM btw)

I believe it's Dawiesm who has some really high 550-590+ DPS parses on T10 and T11 somewhere in this thread as well.

http://i.imgur.com/9NGv1yY.png <- Arthurs DPS

I'm not saying that the Bard and Black Mage are weak in comparison. Not at all. My BLM is a monster. Aikaal is proof of what BLMs can achieve in FCoB. However, what I posted is what Dragoons should be achieving in Turn 10-11. If your Dragoon isn't pulling numbers close to what I posted, then he/she's clearly doing something wrong.

If I could be bothered, I'd find more numbers.

Do you have any videos of your raids with your Dragoon, Sleigh? It would be interesting to analyse what he/she is doing and maybe give some tips. I guarantee if the strategies you use are Melee friendly, then there's definitely room for improvement.

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Originally Posted by rickyguo

I still highly doubt that it's going to be 100 raid dps.

Why don't you start with how much dps your blm and bard is doing in t10-t13?

My numbers will be skewed as I been doing 7mans as monk for the past months.

The issue is that I do about the same damage on DRG as I do on an equally geared monk. I also do similar numbers to a ninja.

You're basically saying that your BLM and BRD is doing more damage than monks, ninjas and dragoons in basically dummy fights and well, that's on your players pressing buttons.

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T10 - BRD 590, has done more but never on a clear since we've only had 2 clears since his Zeta. BLM 580. Sub-6m clear.
T11 - DRG beats us both. BLM 565, BRD 555. Just above 6m clear.
T12 - 3 Bennu group, no one attacks Blackfires but SCH, low downtime vs uptime due to clearing immediately after first dodge phase (IE a group where the fight lasts until near the second dodge phase, most individual numbers will be higher) in a 7m clear - BRD 540, BLM 530ish on average, was far different in 4 Bennu groups.
T13 - BRD and BLM both have done 510 with room for more if add phase didn't die so quickly, more average is 500 for both. Sub-11m clear.

BLM numbers are actually lower as our group DPS goes up, either by letting SCH take over certain roles or hitting the milk phases harder so less for BLM. BRD is high because of fast clear times = less Paeon uptime and sometimes good end time, but that's what I judge by. NIN beats us every turn but T13. DRG usually right below BLM, not far off.

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Originally Posted by Dervy

400 * 1.017 = 406.8 DPS for the Paladin - And even less actually, as afaik there isn't a time where a Ninjitsu perfectly lines up with a TA. Therefore it's not really (1+0.1*10/60), but closer to (1+0.1*10/75). Let's use Lucrezia's parse for example. Overall raid DPS = 3004.03 DPS. http://a.pomf.se/wsakcx.png

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Our raid DPS is over 3600 in T10.

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Originally Posted by Sleigh

T10 - BRD 590

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Fo-real?

Pic/Vids?

As someone with an i130 DRG and a near-i130 MNK, solo MNK isn't very far ahead of solo DRG anymore (using 4-minute dummy tests as a head-to-head, <10dps difference when I adjusted DRG strength down). I'd place the blame on itemization. DRG's is nearly perfect, MNK has the "I need more skill speed... and less skill speed" problem still.

BLM being ahead of DRG doesn't surprise me (it happened to me until around when I got the spear drop, and as the raid got more geared he wasn't able to squeeze as much damage out of adds). BRD being ahead of DRG does, but then, I never quite understood how the hardest-hitting BRDs do it other than in fights where they have a clear uptime advantage.

Your dragoons definitely doing something wrong even if he's lbing. He should be doing more dps than both your blm/bard in every turn based on the numbers you posted.

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Originally Posted by rickyguo

Your dragoons definitely doing something wrong even if he's lbing. He should be doing more dps than both your blm/bard in every turn based on the numbers you posted.

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By every turn you include T13?

You also have to consider the situation isn't going to be as good as most groups when it comes to add phases ... CT combo barely gets to breathe in T10, and T12 that end-time is gonna screw over everyone (put the BLM and BRD in a different clear time in T12 and they'll skyrocket). This is why I wanted to compare groups with similar clear times rather than just "hey I did 600 in my run that lasted 1m longer and I got to multi-DoT and AoE everything" type of run.

T11's about the purest comparison you can get between groups and even that can have a small amount of RNG and a vastly different end time.

I mean one of the groups in my fc did a speed clear and their dragoon dps would be above your bard/blm in every turn I think. Except t13 maybe? I'm not sure. You usually get an increase in dps with faster clear times despite losing the ability to multidot more. Besides, you're not really multidoting anything besides t10 and you're not really aoeing except in t13.

I can actually do a speed run for similar clear times and see the numbers when they lift the lockout.

Like your dragoon should be doing like similar numbers to your ninja or monk adjusted for the -10? dps for the lb. Why is it that your ninja can do a lot more dps under the same conditions yet your dragoon cannot?

If you could find out that DRG's numbers, and any amount of extra milking he may have gotten (IE he for some reason DFDs the Blackfires or doesn't have to LB ever or completely AoEs in T13 add phase instead of burning down the Twin clone because YOLO), that'd be quite helpful.

also why would you not doomspike the adds in t13

the twin clone dies so fast anyways that it doesn't matter if you have 8 players and you're hitting 5 targets with doomspike

it's like asking your blm to use their single target

Mainly because the sooner the Twin dies, the less MP WHM has to spend. We just have everyone burn it down and have BLM/SCH AoE to ensure as much MP (and Foe's MP since less Ballad) and CDs are saved for Bahamut. No reason to maximize the raid's DPS as a whole there since it's timed IMO, the most efficient thing you can do is come out of the add phase with as much available to you as possible.

Hate to interrupt your discussion; just wanted to get some opinions.
I'm on my alex stage now and originally may have gone crit/det, but since we're moving into the expansion and chances are the Zeta weapons will more than likely not receive further upgrades, I'm thinking I'd rather build a decent 50-60 leveling weapon. Meaning I'd probably want some accuracy on there.

I was wondering if anyone was doing something similar and what kind of spread they were considering. The idea is to also keep it somewhat cheap since there is no sense in breaking the bank on it now with heavensward adding new relics.

like it dies so fast with 3 dps that I can't imagine that you'd need to do more than 2 doomspikes or something before it dies with 4 dps

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Originally Posted by HeavensSword

Hate to interrupt your discussion; just wanted to get some opinions.
I'm on my alex stage now and originally may have gone crit/det, but since we're moving into the expansion and chances are the Zeta weapons will more than likely not receive further upgrades, I'm thinking I'd rather build a decent 50-60 leveling weapon. Meaning I'd probably want some accuracy on there.

I was wondering if anyone was doing something similar and what kind of spread they were considering. The idea is to also keep it somewhat cheap since there is no sense in breaking the bank on it now with heavensward adding new relics.

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I doubt you'll need accuracy for leveling. The only things you need accuracy for are things above your level, which you don't really encounter while leveling (unless this changes for the xpac).

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Originally Posted by Viridiana

I doubt you'll need accuracy for leveling. The only things you need accuracy for are things above your level, which you don't really encounter while leveling (unless this changes for the xpac).

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That's true, I guess I was reverting into the FFXI mentality. I'm sure leveling will include the new story, but I wonder if they plan on changing it up a bit, or if it'll just be more FATEs, hests, etc.

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Originally Posted by rickyguo

like it dies so fast with 3 dps that I can't imagine that you'd need to do more than 2 doomspikes or something before it dies with 4 dps

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Yep, it's not long for the world once the actual AoE starts with 3 or 4 DPS. Main reason I specified that is because you can really feed people DPS in that phase if you wished, and since it wouldn't be a real clear time loss either way a group could do it if they so chose. Bahamut DPS + wyvern DPS definitely most important part of the fight.

Only in it for fair results!

Cleared T13 tonight, top dps with 486. Not much considering my gear (i129, only missing T11 ring), but for now I'll settle with this. It's been more than one year of reading this topic, receiving tips whenever I asked (getting some even when I didn't) and understanding the in and outs of this job. This was possible because of this thread and your posts. Thank y'all.

I am so jelly of you guys for being on thoses super fast runs, i really would like to see how high my dps would be with a quick clear.

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Originally Posted by Arthuro-Ray

I am so jelly of you guys for being on thoses super fast runs, i really would like to see how high my dps would be with a quick clear.

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More boring than you might think. Someone dies at all in a way that impacts the clear, 9 times out of 10 we'll insta-run into the wall and wait up to 5 minutes for CDs and pots. Over, and over, and over. Wipe 30s into the pull for some reason? Get a music video ready, cause you're not playing for a few minutes minimum.

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Originally Posted by Dervy

I personally don't like How To Train Your Dragoons oGDC rotation as it's heavily latency influenced. EU players cannot afford to continuously double-pop oGDCs continuously in the opener, especially has BFB has a longer skill/ability/animation lock.


Also, download WTFast if you're a PC user. No reason why you should not be using it. It's a free download and has an unlimited free trial. I play with 96-104ms constantly. Make sure you're connecting to MTL2 sever, as that has the lowest ping + lag spikes I've noticed.

Now. Can you get 9GDCs in a Blood For Blood? If yes, you should be using a delayed BFB before CT (to ensure you can hit 9GDCs). My video here should aid you somewhat: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xfjU6hJC_II. If this is the case, then your opening rotation, as an EU player should be something like:

HT - (IR + PS) - ID - (X-POT) - DI - (Delayed BFB) - CT - (JUMP) - PH - (LegS) - TT - (SSD) - VP - (LS) - FT (DFD).

This is also my opener and it allows for minimal GDC clipping, whilst still allowing to maximise your opening as much as possible.

If you cannot get 9GDCs in a Blood for Blood, then you need to use it before Impulse Drive, so it would be something like:

HT - (BFB) - ID - (X-POT) - DI - (IR + PS) - CT - (JUMP) - PH - (LegS) - TT - (SSD) - VP - (LS) - FT (DFD) = Or switch the X-POT around with the IR + PS.

IR + PS both have very low animation locks (or w/e the terminology is), so you can easily double stack these two, even with a high latency.

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First off, my apologies to the community's EU players and high-latency players. I hadn't realized that connection speed would have such an extreme impact on doubling up off-GCDs.

Second, my own personal experience is that I have no difficulty fitting Power Surge next to Blood for Blood between GCDs, even at fairly extreme levels of Skill Speed. I'm at about 40ms and play in NA. If that's something that people are having difficulty with, then... yeah... my opener becomes problematic, I admit.

That said, I'm pretty convinced that it's ideal if you can manage to pull it off. The main advantage that I believe it has over Dervy's is that it buffs DFD with Internal Release along with everything else (BFB, potion, HT, Dis), whereas Dervy's approach buffs Leg Sweep rather than DFD with IR. Some cursory math of mine, assuming a latent crit rate of 25%, suggests that my opener provides a +12 potency bonus averaging out across runs by comparison. Even if I were to use an opener closer to Dervy's (meaning the first one he lists here), it seems to me that it would be better to swap DFD with Leg Sweep for that reason. But my opener also packs Leg Sweep earlier into the opener while still getting a second BFB-buffed Leg Sweep at about the same time that Dervy's method would. I believe this is another advantage.

There might well be something I'm missing, though... some long-term advantage derived from Dervy's approach, perhaps? I'm not very adept at models, either, so I don't know how to use them to test the approaches against each other, what with the doubling up on off-GCDs.

In any event, it seems like we're dealing with very small differences.

For the record, I definitely love Dervy's opener for people who can't hit 9 BFB-buffed GCDs. I'll have to update HTTYD to include it, since Skill Speed (like latency) has a big impact on what the optimum opener will be.

And this is why I don't believe in the 0.5s rule for oCDs. If they all had a 0.5s animation lock/delay, why is it I can do PS + IR with no GDC clipping even with higher latency, but struggle to do so with PS + BFB? Skills clearly have their own animation lock/delay.

There isn't really a "Long-term advantage" either (at least, not that I've noticed). Having said that, if I'm not using an X-Pot, I usually put a Legsweep in its place so I can get 1 unbuffed and 1 buffed LS before my BFB runs out.

Ages ago, I used to do my opener so IR would be used before DI, thus allowing your DFD to be buffed by Internal Release as well, but it's kind of hard to fit it all into a perfect sequence without clipping, especially as I'm doing 9GDC BFBs. I'm always tweaking and messing around with my opener. Who knows? It might change again next week! Haha

IR's animation is slightly longer than BfB's, however :P

;_;..... I hate skill animation.

In other news, 2-3 weeks more until we get our new Benchmark :D Hopefully it there's some lvl 50-60 skills we can data-mine heuheuheu. Anyone got any interesting idea's they could do to improve our beloved Spear wielding Pole Dancer?