Fine-Tuning PLD rotation - tips?

I know, I know. Play WAR if I want better dps.

That aside, I'm now the mt for a static and I was wondering if I could get some help to pull better numbers. Our static is kinda made up of folks who can't really fit regular raiding into their schedule, so our group comp is a little off, but I'm curious.

Given:
- Healers have requested I stay in Shield Oath 100% of the time
- We have no NIN
- The OT is a DRK
- The BLM does not have Quelling
- We have no MCH (we have a brd)

Is ~800-900 dps acceptable? These are the numbers I've been told I'm getting.

My rotation is as follows:
open with shield lob
Fast Blade - Spirits Within
Savage Blade - Fight or Flight
Rage of Halone - Circle of Scorn
Fast Blade - Bloodbath
into goring blade, then Royal Authority combos unless GB or RoH needs refreshing (for the healers)

So far, all I can think of is to use halone less, but my HP can get distressingly low if I don't keep the debuff up on the boss. I'm saving CoS to use within FoF so I get it off twice each time, and I'm not sure if that's worth doing when the cooldown timers don't line up.

I'm using Sheltron for every Scrapline except FmF, where I use Hallowed, and otherwise rotating Rampart - Foresight - larger buff/conva where appropriate.

Any suggestions? Or am I mostly dependent on the group getting more used to the fight so the healers don't cry when I turn on SwO. We only cleared as a group for the first time last week, although I've now cleared three times.

If they aren't letting you switch around stances then yes, you are stuck at that 800+ range without the BiS pieces that are coming out of the rest of savage. *As long as you're holding aggro there's not REALLY a reason to keep Rage of Halone up, so you can just focus on Goring and Authority rotations.

Not having a slashing debuff really hurts your dps and the drks dps by quite a bit what i'd propose doing is:

-Getting your Drk or you to swap to War
-Recruit a Nin not only for slashing but for threat up and threat down
-Being out of Shield Oath
-Communicate with your healers to see where the issue is

You being in Shield Oath 100% of the time with no slashing debuff you're going to stay in the 800-900 range until some changes are made or healers are more comfortable with you being in sword oath.

I would assume those you have cleared are 9 and possibly 10, so off that all I can comment is you can definitely push more than those numbers for sure, better rotation is to keep FoF before goring/ra for the most part, you want to delay your FoF during opener, the subsequent FoFs are always in consideration of the normal timing you clear and ofc your current combo you are in. You can fit 4 comboes into a FoF and you normally want to use it before your 3rd combo finisher, ra goring mostly and general rule still applies to have 2 gorings in each FoF application unless under different circumstances like bursting certain adds or boss is jumping around/going invulnerable etc.

Another thing to touch though, how are the healers struggle to heal a full tank stance PLD? Even if the healers contribute a good amount of damage, it's just too jarring that they can't keep you up comfortably. The damages coming out aren't even that high in the first place.

The best time to use fight or flight is right before goring blade. This let's you get a second goring blade out just before the current dot and fight or flight buffs drop off.

I know this addresses none of your questions, but there really is little to no point trying to rotationally optimal, when others in your group don't even have the basic requirements for their role. I mean a BLM without quelling... I can't even... you're either having to already use much more aggro combo just to hold off them, or their dps is incredibly low. From what you say, it sounds like the latter.

So while you can tweak your rotation about to squeak an extra 100 dps (? no idea, number out the air), what's the point if your blm is already doing far below what they could be doing

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Originally Posted by Dzian

The best time to use fight or flight is right before goring blade. This let's you get a second goring blade out just before the current dot and fight or flight buffs drop off.

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Amendment to that: FoF lasts for 30sec. If you pop it before 1st goring, your last gcd before FoF expire is ra. FoF > GB > RA combo > RA combo > GB combo > RA combo > FoF ends. In a lot of the cases using FoF right before goring blade can be undesired, you potentially apply less FoFs throughout fights, sometimes you aren't using the full uptime like if boss dies/jumps and you have like 10secs left on FoF etc. In some fights, activating FoF at pull is a gain dps, for example a6s where you pick mine as pld or nidhogg where he just flies very quickly. It's always fight to fight and phase by phase basis.

So long as you have 2 gorings in each FoF you can consider it under the ideal circumstance, the bonus being ra buffed instead of roh which falls under that small nitpicking that nets you more potency.

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Originally Posted by Sarcatica

So long as you have 2 gorings in each FoF you can consider it under the ideal circumstance, the bonus being ra buffed instead of roh which falls under that small nitpicking that nets you more potency.

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That's assuming he's not clipping his own DoT. Depending on his gear, the current skill speed is enough to allow a Pld to clip their DoT at ~6 seconds, barring no interruptions to the rotation. It's still a case by case issue, but it's another nit-picky thing to keep an eye on in regards to looking out for dps loss. Regardless, it sounds to me like the main problem here is more with the party synergy rather than his rotation.

Firstly, healers who are letting his Hp get "distressingly low" while rotating RoH on top of 100% up-time on Shield Oath rings a few warning bells to me, particularly the RoH part. It's hard to judge without seeing one of the fights first hand, but I have to ask why his Hp is dropping so low. There are only three possible reasons that I can think of:

(1)The tank is not rotating their CD's well enough.
(2)The healers are not anticipating the mechanics.
(3)The healers are too busy baby-sitting the dps.

If the problem is 1, then he just needs to get more practice in. There's only so many ways to fine-tune a tank CD rotation for boss mechs, so eventually he'll get it down. Once he does, he'll be more comfortable swapping stances and his healers might trust him more to do it. At the very least, he shouldn't have to rotate RoH just to keep himself alive.

If the problem 2 or 3, however, then the problem isn't with the tank. It's with the party. This is what sounds to be the main issue based on the OP's description, because, again, he should not need to be rotating RoH consistently just to stay alive. Enmity obviously isn't a problem, because they have a Drk for an OT and their dps is sub-optimal. That leaves either dps who are standing in WAY too much stupid and not scoring enough dps, or healers who are not comfortable with the mechanics of the fight yet and are letting the dmg get too far out of hand. Both of these possibilities are FAR greater dps reductions than anything the Pld can compensate for alone, so there's really not much he can do unless they fix some of the more fundamental issues facing their group. Quite frankly, it sounds like they need to step up a bit. Either that, or they need to step down and be replaced by more competent players.

Another thing that people forget is that Drk gets more dps being the MT vs being the OT due to blood price and reprisal. Even in pugs if I have a nin with a pld I tell em I'm gonna MT people have this fallacy in their head that pld is the defacto MT when they're not, any tank can be but drk benefits the most out of war and pld. Try having the drk MT and practice your dps more while being in sword oath then grab a ninja to compare that's the best I can tell you.

- Healers have requested I stay in Shield Oath 100% of the time
- We have no NIN
- The OT is a DRK
- The BLM does not have Quelling
- We have no MCH (we have a brd)

1. If your healers can't heal you without tank stance there are two options: you use your cd's not properly or they are bad. If you know how to use your cd's properly they are bad and have to learn how to heal you without tank stance.

2. Get a Ninja or keep on going with less dps from you and your OT but its still doable.

3. No Problem here even if the WAR is a better OT in general.

4. BLM without quelling is just....sorry i can only facepalm to that. Tell him to get that damn skill or kick him.

5. Nothing wrong here. MCH would push your dps a bit more but you can raid with a BRD instead of a MCH without any problems.

Are your healers well geared? Is one solo healing the fights? Which jobs are your healers? Since it could be that your healers are not performing optimally. If they require you to be 100% in tankstance because they complaining about the damage you taking then you need to manage your CD's properly or they need to know how to precast their heals properly.

Having no NIN is not the end of the world, just you holding yourself and the DRK back in DPS.

The BLM I would actually highly suggest that they get Quelling Strikes since not having it in a raid environment is just bad on their side since it require you to use more of your aggro combo rather than your Royal Authority combo... and if they not having aggro issues without Quelling then they are doing something wrong on BLM.

Honestly.....roll as War and make the DRK MT. Storms Path is a godsend for progression and if you don't have a NIN then the Unchained Defiance pull is just too OP.

Please don't say you run double WHM healers as well.

If you have to keep up Shield Oath for both healers to keep you up regardless of CDS then they are just bad. A9S was pretty much solo healable in i240 gear.

I'm gonna echo other sentiments here and say that your group is holding back your DPS more than your rotation.

This rotation might not be optimal, but it works astoundingly well for me and my group; and let's me still do a decent amount of dps while maintaining hate in raid content.

Vit Pot> Fight or Flight> Circle of Scorn> Fracture> Spirits Within> Goring Blade Combo> Halone Combo> Royal Authority Combo, and then rotating mainly between Goring and Royal while throwing in the [Spirits>Fracture>Scorn] combo (in that order), and then Halone if I see hate slipping.

Depending on which fight we're on, I may switch to sword oath right after my first Halone Combo.

Again, I'm not saying this optimal. But I like the Vit Pot at beginning since that's when I first apply my dots. It usually drops right around when Rage of Halone hits.

Just tossing it out there but Fracture is a waste of a GCD. Proven multiple times over.

Thanks everyone for the tips!

We have an ast/sch combo, in a9s the ast does the adds and the sch does the healing although I get regens from the ast periodically.

I've been doing clears in RF, as has the SCH, and when we met back up as a group after christmas I found that my hp was far less... wobbly. I didn't have any issues dumping halone completely (although I made our SCH cry) and I've been switching to SwO after first adds, hopping back in for scrapline. Probably as we get more used to the fight I'll be able to switch sooner.

(I do keep poking the blm about quelling, and I'm levelling WAR, because so far on a10s prog we don't have the dps for the steamroller even with a NIN subbing for our drg, and having a more reasonable group comp would help with that, I think)

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Originally Posted by Mirateski

Thanks everyone for the tips!

We have an ast/sch combo, in a9s the ast does the adds and the sch does the healing although I get regens from the ast periodically.

I've been doing clears in RF, as has the SCH, and when we met back up as a group after christmas I found that my hp was far less... wobbly. I didn't have any issues dumping halone completely (although I made our SCH cry) and I've been switching to SwO after first adds, hopping back in for scrapline. Probably as we get more used to the fight I'll be able to switch sooner.

(I do keep poking the blm about quelling, and I'm levelling WAR, because so far on a10s prog we don't have the dps for the steamroller even with a NIN subbing for our drg, and having a more reasonable group comp would help with that, I think)

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That's more on the individual performance rather than the comp itself. To lack the damage to kill steamroller means that your damage dealers aren't performing to the standard.

A9s and a10s were both cleared in a day with i240s by the top groups, if your team somehow can't meet the damage requirement after so many months of gearing up, it can only mean 1 thing.

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Originally Posted by Mirateski

I do keep poking the blm about quelling, and I'm levelling WAR, because so far on a10s prog we don't have the dps for the steamroller even with a NIN subbing for our drg, and having a more reasonable group comp would help with that, I think

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That's a group issue for sure since it doesn't fall just on the tanks but DPS as a whole, I'm glad to see your healers are adapting to you being in SwO however you say the Ast does adds and Sch does the healing? Does that mean that the Sch is the main or off healer?

It just sounds like DPS isn't up to snuff yet but keep practicing and you'll get it but parse yourself and keep posting you'll get responses, but as posted above me after so many months of gearing up this was cleared in 240 and the rest in crafted gear as we're coming up on the next hurdle of patches where you should already be way up there as a raider or have cleared, your group needs to step it up.

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Originally Posted by Mirateski

(I do keep poking the blm about quelling, and I'm levelling WAR, because so far on a10s prog we don't have the dps for the steamroller even with a NIN subbing for our drg, and having a more reasonable group comp would help with that, I think)

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Get your DPS players to do the SSS for A10S if they havent already. Tell them to save their cooldowns for the steamroller phase if you need a little extra push.

Would you be open to experiment? if so, may i suggest do 1 or 2 Rage of Halone combo and then straight up drop shield oath, not even putting on sword oath. and then use fight or flight to buff up your Goring blade+circle of scorn. Use a rampart to get yourself that +20% mitigation from Shield Oath if it pleases your healers

it sounds crazy right? but you don't benefit from sword oath until 9-12 GCDs later, since it only give you additional Autos. So establish your aggro and then drop shield's -20% penalty, (btw, dropping shield does not eat at your gcd) get about 2 full rotations (pot+gore + circle of scorn, and royal authority) in and pop back to shield oath.

Also you mentioned getting 2 Circle of scorn in your Fight or Flight. That's great, but if you use FoF just before Goring Blade, you can safely get 2 Goring + 2 SoC within 1 FoF

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Originally Posted by hakurou46

Get your DPS players to do the SSS for A10S if they havent already. Tell them to save their cooldowns for the steamroller phase if you need a little extra push.

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Echoing this. If your DPS are above i255, instead get them to do the A12S Dummy.

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Originally Posted by Deus_ex_Machina

Would you be open to experiment?

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Always, but I think my healers would spontaneously combust if I tried it, lmao.

I'm now solidly topping 950+ dps in full shield oath, but when I try to switch to sword oath, I keep dying. I'm not 100% sure why? I start out with rampart, then use bulwark after the scrap bomb, use sheltron for every scrapline except fmf (where I use hallowed), then I use foresight for the second add set into sentinel then back into rampart, and basically rotate as they come up. Awareness I pop right at the start, conva I pop as it seems necessary. Sometimes I get crit like five times in a row which just seems silly?

I mentioned this to my group and they told me that clearing was more important than dpsing, which is of course true, but I feel quite stagnant. We're seeing a lot of phases and I want to help as much as I can.

As for telling dps to do anything, they already get a bit annoyed that I keep getting on at the blm about quelling, I can't see asking them to do SSS going down well. I was recruited to the static by someone the original 6 recruited so I'm a step removed from the rest of them, who are all friends, and it seems a bit rude to come in and be all demanding about stuff, haha.

Edit to add: I'm pretty sure we're all above 255. I'd hope so, considering! I'm at 260 bang on, and my MCH is at 255 with only like half the shire set, so...

Second edit: I'm opening with one halone combo to ensure hate from blm and mnk (I lose it otherwise), then go FB > spirits > RB > FoF > goring > CoS > FB > rampart > SB > bloodbath and into the 2xRA, 1xGB rotation, popping offglobals as they come up and keeping an eye on my cooldowns as much as poss. I wanted to try and drop DV on the party for acid rain but I'm not sure if that helps or hinders really. Especially when I swing around to fmf after scrapline they all get nervous, so I've just taken to hanging out over W and stoneskinning myself for shits and giggles.

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Originally Posted by Mirateski

Second edit: I'm opening with one halone combo to ensure hate from blm and mnk (I lose it otherwise), then go FB > spirits > RB > FoF > goring > CoS > FB > rampart > SB > bloodbath and into the 2xRA, 1xGB rotation, popping offglobals as they come up and keeping an eye on my cooldowns as much as poss.

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Your opener should be Halone for aggro if you need it, then:
Fast Blade -> FoF -> (CoS, Spirits and Riot Blade in any order) -> Goring Blade -> 2xRA -> Circle of Scorn -> Goring Blade -> FoF ends and you go back to doing your normal rotations. For maximum dps you want to get a Shield Swipe in under this as well, and that gives you a little bit of threat anyway so it's good. I sometimes Sheltron just to get it in my opener rotation.

Moving in to Divine Veil the party during Acid is only worth it if you're offtanking, which since you need to maintain aggro you're obviously not.

Shield oath is nothing but a weaker inner beast, even without a nin in a group you shouldn't lose aggro to anyone unless you have a monk.

Monk is the only class that cannot decrease enemity, and if your blm doesn't want to spend time getting quelling then he doesn't need to be raiding, point blank period.

Even in a pld/drk situation, most of the dos is going to come from your group, it only means that BOTH tanks can sit in off tank stance without a issue. As a pld you should MT because your combos generate more aggro naturally and the drk does not.

You don't need a nin or slashing to clear this content you just need to work as a group.

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Originally Posted by KorenA

Shield oath is nothing but a weaker inner beast, even without a nin in a group you shouldn't lose aggro to anyone unless you have a monk.

Monk is the only class that cannot decrease enemity, and if your blm doesn't want to spend time getting quelling then he doesn't need to be raiding, point blank period.

Even in a pld/drk situation, most of the dos is going to come from your group, it only means that BOTH tanks can sit in off tank stance without a issue. As a pld you should MT because your combos generate more aggro naturally and the drk does not.

You don't need a nin or slashing to clear this content you just need to work as a group.

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I'm curious as to your thoughts on how ShO is a weaker IB o.o

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Originally Posted by LilLemay

I'm curious as to your thoughts on how ShO is a weaker IB o.o

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If you are looking into the best scenario for tanks, ShO/Grit is a weaker IB indeed, you are losing damage potential from each gcd consumed when switching stance. In the highest lvl of play, WAR don't even use Defiance for too long when pulling, much less Unchained.

You are free to look at the top speedrun parses via FFlogs for convincing data.

It's very confusing to compare ShO/Grit and IB since the only crossover between them is the 20% damage reduction, and even that has a difference in that IB only lasts 6s and ShO/Grit can last as long as you keep them on for. It then gets even more confusing when you start considering that you need to be in Defiance to use IB and Defiance is a more direct parallel to ShO/Grit.

A potentially better way to put it would be saying that you currently only go into your tanking stance for aggro (which isn't even necessary if you have a WAR and he pulls) as the damage reduction isn't necessary especially when it costs a large chunk of your DPS, which is king in XIV.

Anyway, to keep things on topic I'd recommend just not raiding. I know that seems blunt and probably pretty weird since you clearly care about DPS and are therefore more competent than the majority playerbase, but the thing that leads me to that statement is this:

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Our static is kinda made up of folks who can't really fit regular raiding into their schedule, so our group comp is a little off, but I'm curious.

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I imagine you're in a bit of a forced hand situation - you want to raid, but due to your schedule you're stuck with this really poorly constructed group. You care about your DPS and helping the group, but the healers don't want you out of tank stance, you don't have a NIN, you don't have a WAR, and the BLM won't get Quelling. So essentially you're left with 3 realistic options:

1. Level WAR and switch mains, letting you focus more on DPS as well as benefiting the group by applying Storm's Eye (and Storm's Path as necessary). I imagine you like PLD, or perhaps you don't have enough time in the day to level a whole new class, but realistically this is the only way to fix your group comp as-is and improve your overall experience.

2. Quit raiding. Let's be realistic here, if you care about working as a team and upping your group's potential while improving yourself and the rest of your team just kind of "shows up" then you're a bad match for eachother. I have been a part of a few raid groups with conflicting interests, and all of them fell apart because of it. Quitting all together and finding another game to play, or picking up a new hobby, will probably lead to a lot more fun.

3. Stop caring about DPS. Just do what they do and show up. Make friends with your other raid buddies and try to make the atmosphere relaxing and enjoyable. Maybe, eventually, this will lead to them thinking that working as a team is productive and more satisfying, though that's unlikely to click for awhile.

I realize you are one of the relative few who actually cares about his performance in the group and helping the group as a whole, but based on your circumstances these are the only options I see working out positively. Your slight increase to Shield Oath DPS is essentially a drop in the water. Your heart is in the right place, but your group is holding you back, and due to your scheduling I imagine you're not going to be able to find a group that has the same mentality as you.

But who knows I could be off the mark entirely. If you're having fun either way, then I'd recommend just not really caring about your DPS to an optimized level as being stuck in ShO will kill all the optimizations you make.

Maybe you need to find a new group who is as serious as you are. Straight up.

Savage level content has a lot of mechanics which you can skip with high DPS.
Staying in Shield oath the entire time is slowing you down and thus causing your static to deal with more mechanics.
The only time I am in Shield oath is when I do my pull or when we have multiple people down and I need to make the life easier for our healers.
A10S i only go into shield oath right after adds phase for a few seconds as I'm usually out of CD's then. (Hallowed ground middle button mechanic cheesing FTW!)

A WAR OT or NIN will greatly boost your DPS as well as others have said.

Our BLM pulls crazy levels of aggro even with quelling strikes and me in opening in shield oath. He. Must. Get. It. If your BLM is anywhere near that level of damage as ours, I feel for ya.

We use a BRD instead of MCH, both classes have their pros and cons. We have quite a few casters thus Foe's Requiem is a great damage booster for us. Bot are good and acceptable.

I seriously recommend not using FoF with RoH combo.
Especially if your healers are forcing you to stay in Shield Oath, you don't need that extra enmity. What you need is extra DPS.
As others have stated, always make sure you use it before Goring blade. This way you can use it 2x during FoF. Goring blade when it ticks for 75% is our biggest damage skill! Royal Authority might be our direct damage skill, but goring blade deals more damage.

Sword Oath tanking is a lot different than Shield oath tanking in savage, it is key to use cooldowns smartly, properly, plan ahead and mitigate the correct damage types at the right time.
A9S Scrapline? 1x RoH combo when he uses stockpile, Shelltron and a normal guaranteed Cd (Rampart, Foresight, Sentinel depending on damage levels and healers pre-shielding). Sometimes a CD isnt even needed depending on your healers and team. When i get a crit shield from our SCH, the AST uses disable and our SMN virus? CD is not needed as i'll be taking 0 damage anyways, so plan accordingly and keep an eye on the situation.

Also another tip i can give you is to Force proc your shield bash for a DPS increase depending on if you really need Bulwark/Shelltron or not. Start with bullwark, force a proc. Once it ends and shield bash is nearly off CD? Shelltron and force another. Like I said, smart use of CD's is key. You dont want to force a proc with shelltron for example when a physical tankbuster is incoming!

Your first and foremost job is to tank, this means keeping the party safe, you are that first and last line of defense. Once you got that down, maximize damage.

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Originally Posted by Mirateski

Given:
- Healers have requested I stay in Shield Oath 100% of the time

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use rage of halone and change to sword oath the healer will not notice any diffrence ;-)

anyway even in shield oath you should be able to do easy 1k dps just never move away from boss/mob -> ~25% of your dps is just about stay close to boss without pressing any buttons xD

regards hobbit

PS: when you die -> first blame healer than pretend you were in shield oath :'-D

General thread update: according to a friend of mine who parses, I'm now at least solidly netting 1k dps minimum in full shield oath in i260.

My static... are probably not going to keep me around for much longer, for a variety of reasons unrelated to my fervent desire to use sword oath, so there's that.

Our blm does not pull stupid crazy aggro levels, honestly. A friend of mine who plays smn and sch can hit ridiculous numbers that make me weep blood on smn and he definitely has quelling.

I've started practising the general rotation while in shield oath, so when I start hopping it'll be second nature, but using FoF after fast blade then CoS after riot blade has really helped me keep aggro a lot better than the previous rotation I was using. It's surprising how much of a difference it makes!

I'm probably going to be running 9s and 10s with mostly members of my fc from now on, so I may be stuck in shield oath for a week or two while our totally fresh ast gets used to the mechanics in both floors, but I'm confident that moving forward I'll be able to really push my dps, my stance dancing and work on fine-tuning my cooldown usage. That, and I levelled WAR to 60 and have been practising the rotation for that, so as soon as I get the axe from zurvan I should be ready to jump into high-end content on that, too.

Thanks so much to everyone for all your tips!

So then that's basically that if your healers can't accept you pushing DPS then find a new static this is a decision you should have made because it seems that you're not happy at all. You need to find good healers and make friends with a War/Nin and start doing stuff out of ShO, start at EX primals like Sophia that are laughably easy, and even A9S which is a tank n spank fight.

If you're switching to war with a 265 axe instead though stick with that, if you can do Zurvan EX which is a SUPER easy brain dead fight you can do A9S as an OT war, learn it that way, and move onto A10S+. Your static shouldn't of been holding you back because you weren't satisfied and now we're onto the next big content patch with easier ways to get 260 and 270 gear so it should be easier for you and others as well.

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Originally Posted by Mirateski

I'm probably going to be running 9s and 10s with mostly members of my fc from now on, so I may be stuck in shield oath for a week or two while our totally fresh ast gets used to the mechanics in both floors

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Small last tip of advice: Assuming your other healer is seasoned, start with stance dancing as soon as possible. The AST needs to get used to the damage levels you will sustain in sword oath/deliverance so they too can plan accordingly.
We have a guaranteed WHM and our second healer swaps between AST/SCH. The WHM being our main healer (although she does DPS when she can), the secondary healer generally only helps out in high damage phases of fights or when pre-shielding is necessary.

Savage is all about working together with your group and getting a feel for one another, then adjust tactics to what works for your group. A guide will only help somewhat. (Just a heads up, Raidfinder always has its own "Set ways" of doing things and most people do not like deviating from that)

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Originally Posted by Only1zbro

Just tossing it out there but Fracture is a waste of a GCD. Proven multiple times over.

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Oh? I play PLD a lot, but don't main it (DRG & DRK). Curious, but can you reference me to a good discussion thread on why not to use Fracture? It sounds intriguing.

Thanks in advance =)

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Originally Posted by Mirateski

My rotation is as follows:
open with shield lob
Fast Blade - Spirits Within
Savage Blade - Fight or Flight
Rage of Halone - Circle of Scorn
Fast Blade - Bloodbath
into goring blade, then Royal Authority combos unless GB or RoH needs refreshing (for the healers)

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Not sure if this has been mentioned before, but if the boss is using physical attacks, you can precast Sheltron to proc Shied Swipe at the beginning. The enmity it gives, combined with Shield Oath, could, at best, bypass your first RoH combo right into Goring Blade and, at worst, allow an opener with RA combo, since Savage Blade got a nice enmity boost.

On a sidenote, it should give better results to let the DRK MT to make the most of Blood Price and Reprisal.

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Originally Posted by TenZer0

Curious, but can you reference me to a good discussion thread on why not to use Fracture? It sounds intriguing.

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Basically, Fracture has a 220 cumulative potency. The average potency on PLD's rotation is higher than that (Unless you spam RoH combo :p). So, by using Fracture, you're decreasing your average potency per GCD.

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

Basically, Fracture has a 220 cumulative potency. The average potency on PLD's rotation is higher than that (Unless you spam RoH combo :p). So, by using Fracture, you're decreasing your average potency per GCD.

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Ahh, that's interesting. Thanks for the note!

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

Basically, Fracture has a 220 cumulative potency. The average potency on PLD's rotation is higher than that (Unless you spam RoH combo :p). So, by using Fracture, you're decreasing your average potency per GCD.

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To be a bit more specific, the Royal Authority combo has an average potency of ~233 for ~63 TP per gcd and the Goring Blade combo has an average potency of 200 with a dot that deals 50 potency every 3s for 24s (~40 potency per gcd) for 60 TP per gcd.

A 9 gcd GB -> RA -> RA rotation and clipping the last tick of the GB dot the average potency of the rotation will be ~261 for ~58.8 TP per gcd.
A 10 gcd GB -> RA -> RA -> Frac rotation that does not clip the last tick of the GB dot the average potency of the rotation will be 262 for 61 TP per gcd.

Using Fracture is basically a .3% dps increase at the cost of a 6% increase in TP consumption.

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

Using Fracture is basically a .3% dps increase at the cost of a 6% increase in TP consumption.

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If you clip GB, then you may have too much skill speed.

I've made a calculation on a 90 GCD window and using Fracture is a DPS gain only if you clip GB on at least 9 full rotations. In real situations where you probably move a little and might lose some tenth of a second, it's mostly innefective.

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

If you clip GB, then you may have too much skill speed.

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Clipping will happen no matter what. Even a base gcd of 2.5 will clip a 24s dot if inputs are perfect. 22.5s for 9 gcds does that, but you will get the 8 ticks (for 400 damage) if the first tick happens between 0s and 1.5s after the dot is applied.

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I've made a calculation on a 90 GCD window and using Fracture is a DPS gain only if you clip GB on at least 9 full rotations. In real situations where you probably move a little and might lose some tenth of a second, it's mostly innefective.

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Agreed, and to get to that point you would need around a 2.00 gcd and would burn through all of your TP in a 90s rotation.