Yoshi P talks about Warriors- from Producer Letter Live @ TGS

[Tronic]

It's rare I would ever use the Stun on DPS unless it was my turn to interrupt something. Using this ability outside of set perimeters on most bosses will wipe the raid.

Unless it's a boss that has a mechanic that needs stunning (ex: Ifrit's eruptions), you are free to stun to your heart's content. Also note that this is an optimal theoretical setup, and given the logic you propose one could argue a paladin would hold on to spirits within if the boss had a mechanic that needed silencing, or would never *always* be at 100% health to get the most out of spirits within. So if you give one the benefit of perfect playing conditions to do the calculations you need to give the other side the same benefit to be coherent.

That being said, when I'm not in fights where stun is needed for interruption purposes, i'll use stun liberally to bump my dps, and I haven't had problems doing this.

[Dhex]

Yoshida:
Let's get down to business
To defeat the coil.
Did they send me WARs
When we asked for PLDS?
You're the saddest bunch I ever met
But you can bet before we're through
Mister, I'll make a tank
Out of you!

Defiance is a borefest
But ignoring it is a sin
Once you find your Wrath V
You are sure to win.

You're a spineless, weak pathetic lot
And you haven't got a clue.
Somehow I'll make a tank
Out of you.

I'm never gonna catch my breath
Say goodbye to those who knew me
Boy, was I a fool in pick axe as a tool!
This guy's got heals scared to death
Hope DMG doesn't go right through me
Now I really wish that I knew how to mitigate

[WHM] BE A TANK
We must be swift as a coursing river
[WHM] BE A TANK
With all the force of a great typhoon
[WHM] BE A TANK
With all the strength of a raging fire
Mysterious as the dark side of the moon

DMG is racing toward us
'til the Inner Beast drive.
Heed my every order
And you might survive.

You're unsuited for the rage of war
So pack up, go home you're through
How could I make a tank
Out of you?

[WHM] BE A TANK
We must be swift as a coursing river
[WHM] BE A TANK
With all the force of a great typhoon
[WHM] BE A TANK
With all the strength of a raging fire
Mysterious as the dark side of the moon

[everyone]BE A TANK
We must be swift as a coursing river
[everyone]BE A TANK
With all the force of a great typhoon
[everyone]BE A TANK
With all the strength of a raging fire
Mysterious as the dark side of the moon
Hoo-ah!

[Kitru]

That being said, you made a little boo boo in this equation.

Yeah, it was one that I made when I was first putting them down (so used to using .0XXXs for multipliers >.<). I caught it on the latter 2, but didn't manage to catch and correct it on the first. Taking care of it now.

Also, I'd include WAR's stun for completeness' sake in this equation.

Stuns are a bit different from the silence from Spirits Within. There aren't that many fights where you really need a silence (Dhorne Chimera is the only one that I've seen). Stuns, on the other hand, are a major part of a lot of mechanics. As such, I wouldn't include Brutal Swing since it doesn't follow the same use case.

Another point: since you're assuming "Auto-attacks provides a baseline 83.33 potency per GCD (2.5/3)", shouldn't you also assume that Sword Oath should be multiplied by 2.5/3? If so, PLDs optimal dps goes down to 417 from 423.

The damage provided by your weapon as I listed isn't an assumption. That's just what it does. The damage from Sword Oath isn't a 50% increase in the damage of auto-attacks (I initially believed this but was corrected). As it turns out, Sword Oath deals a potency 50 blow every time you hit with an auto-attack. As such, the assumption I made that the attack rate was equal to the GCD (as previously mentioned, this is actually ends up devaluing the theoretical DPS because most PLD weapons lie in the 2.1-2.3 range) is explicitly that: an extra 50 per weapon swing, which occurs once per GCD. Sword Oath is a helluva lot stronger than you might think because of this.

You state "Internal Release actually drops its contribution to 3.57% increase".

That was an error in inputting the formula on my end. The number actually drops to 2.72%, which drops tank WAR potency per GCD by ~3.

Also I think this section needs to include the effect of Unchained, given it's trying to determine optimal dps in tank stance.

It's not about absolutely maximizing dps in tank stance. It's about maximizing DPS in tank stance while maintaining optimal mitigation. Mitigation is *still* the most important thing for a tank so using Unchained to maximize DPS works in contradiction of that.

Or are you saying they create an additional 50% enmity bonus ON TOP OF the already existing 50% extra damage bonus?

Yes. From what I've researched, critical hits generate an additional 50% threat on top of what they already generate by doing more damage. This makes losing Wrath a *lot* more significant than previously believed.

P.S. Just realized through another post you should include the DPS from vengeance as well in all 3 sections! Add it as a modifier to autoattack, perhaps.

Vengeance would make no sense to bring up for the non-tank DPS numbers. If you're not tanking, Vengeance is doing nothing for you because you're not getting attacked. Furthermore, Vengeance is *really* weird to factor in because there are so many variables that are outside of the tank's control. Even if it's a tank and spank fight, you can't be sure of the damage that vengeance will deal because you have to take a *specific* type of damage for it to go off: if the damage is fully absorbed by a shield or dodged, it doesn't deal damage. On top of that, you don't even know how fast the attacks will come because boss based attack rates differ and bosses use *loads* of casts. Under a baseline assumption of one attack every 2.5 seconds, ignoring dodges and fully absorbed attacks, Vengeance would add 6 ticks of 50 potency every 48 GCDs (120 seconds), or 6.25 damage potency. That's really not that much and it's making a *lot* of assumptions about its performance.

Basically, it boils down to Vengeance having *way* too many variables that I don't have solid numbers for that cause it to vacillate in performance *way* too much. Plus, even if it *was* used, it wouldn't add that much.

Btw, in case anyone asks, Inner Beast can easily be factored in because it deals the same damage as Fracture. An IB rotation would simply replace Fracture with it (you can't add in a Fracture later because then you'd lose 100% uptime on Storm's Eye).

P.S. Thanks for catching the math errors. I'm not perfect, nor do I have any delusions of being so. I post the formulas to go along with my numbers so that other people can vet them as well as understand them.

[The_Brute]

sorry defense dont scale much at all.
ilv90 gloves give 113defense and ilv70 heavy darklight gloves give 109defense, whooping increased only by 4 (3%)with 20 itemlevel difference.

Oh well was worth a shot. Thanks for the response.

[Kitru]

TLDR: It's not a free off GCD 50 potency 30 second CD attack; using it like so would get you kicked from any raid group.

On top of that, even if you *do* use it on CD, it adds a whopping 4.167 potency per GCD. Combined with Vengeance (6.25 pot/GCD), that's ~11 potency total from abilities I chose to ignore for previously given reasons. It gives a slight advantage, but it's still well withing the realms of "barely better", especially when you perform the DPS dilution in raid damage scenarios as I said before. A 10% increase in DPS from a tank is a laughable contribution to total DPS.

[Tronic]

Hi Kitru,

Your equations in the DPS in tanking stance section and Enmity section still have 1.02375 instead of 1.0476 for the Wrath V dps boost. 1.02375 was the DPS out-of-tanking-stance modifier for Internal Release, which you've changed already in tanking stance to 1.0272.

DPS in tanking stance equation:

WAR:
(213.85 * 1.0556 + 83.33 * 1.11) * 1.2 * /.9 * 1.02375 * 1.0272 * .75 = 334.66 potency per GCD

Enmity in tanking stance equation:

WAR:
(446.15 * 1.0556 + 83.33 * 1.11) * 1.2 * /.9 * (1.02375 * 1.5) * (1.0272 * 1.5) * .75 * 2 = 2666.36 enmity potency per GCD

I just found another boo-boo. In your enmity section you state about the PLD:

"Put that into the optimized combo and you get 967 enmity per GCD ((2050 * 3 + 220) / 10)"

If you calculate ((2050 * 3 + 220) / 10) it comes out to 637, not 967. That results in 1355 enmity potency per GCD for the paladin.

Yes. From what I've researched, critical hits generate an additional 50% threat on top of what they already generate by doing more damage. This makes losing Wrath a *lot* more significant than previously believed.

This is ... interesting. So if you only want to maximize Enmity, you'd stick with a plain repeating BB combo and Wrath V:

WAR:
(716.67 * 1.0556 + 83.33 * 1.11) * 1.2 * /.9 * (1.02375 * 1.5) * (1.0272 * 1.5) * .75 * 2 = 4015 enmity potency per GCD

However that result sounds just wayyy too high. Are you SURE the proper way to calculate isn't (1 + 0.0272*1.5) instead of (1.0272*1.5) ? Your original equation just doesn't make sense. I haven't seen real world results that suggest a war can multiply his aggro by 2.25 by using wrath 5 + internal release (because in the end you are multiplying everything by *1.5*1.5, not just the crit dmg).

P.S. Even though you conclude in the enmity section that "WARs *do* generate a metric shitton more enmity than a PLD does", you start off that section by saying "Another fun exercise is demonstrating that WAR doesn't even have an advantage over PLD as far as enmity is concerned." I guess you wrote that second line before you did the math?

[Kitru]

Your equations in the DPS in tanking stance section and Enmity section still have 1.02375 instead of 1.0476 for the Wrath V dps boost.

Yes, I replaced the wrong number. This is what I get for changing numbers when I haven't eaten yet. Furthermore, the tiny edit/post windows make it hard as hell to see stuff. /shakefist

I just found another boo-boo. In your enmity section you state about the PLD:
If you calculate ((2050 * 3 + 220) / 10) it comes out to 637, not 967. That results in 1355 enmity potency per GCD for the paladin.

Corrected.

This is ... interesting. So if you only want to maximize Enmity, you'd stick with a plain repeating BB combo and Wrath V:

Yup. Even if Wrath V weren't there, the highest enmity/GCD you can generate is with BB spam.

I'm actually starting to think that the "secret" that the developers are privy to that we aren't is the regular use of Storm's Path. You don't need to use BB all that much because the enmity advantage is already so high, so the error we might be making is in completely abandoning the self-heal from it. I *doubt* it could make all that much of a different though, because, if you swap out 2 of the BB combos for SP, you'd only be getting 19.2 (250 * .5 * 2 / 13) damage potency as healing per GCD which is a fair bit less than Bloodbath (8.33% average potency as healing over time; at 342.45 potency per GCD, that's 28.5 damage potency as healing per GCD).

However that result sounds just wayyy too high.

I think you're right. It should be 1 + x * .5, not 1.x *1.5. I'll correct that. It'll likely bring the WAR enmity per GCD down to a more sane number.

I guess you wrote that second line before you did the math?

Yes, I did.

[Dhex]

-

Funnily enough I can tank Ifrit HM -> Tomahawk x2 -> Storm's Path Combo then use Ability CDs, Infuriate, and Inner Beast (never touching Flash/Voke/BB Combo) and never lose hate.

It does give a 125-150HP return every 5s-7.5s-5s but it's still not nearly enough.

And yes you can do a Storm's Path rotation compounded occasionally with Berserk and Internal Release and Bloodbath and Unchained and Vengeance and it still doesn't account for enough self-healing at the back end of the fight to survive past the half way mark - WHM/SCH are going to have to compensate for you.

edit*

I'd like to point out it seems like WHM want to use their MP in the same manner as they would a PLD tanking - which just doesn't track for a WAR tank. It forces the Healer to be proactive - Stoneskin on a 6000HP WAR is easily worth 1000 Shield but I don't no how effective this would be considered in comparison to waiting for the tank to eat damage and simply using Cure II on them.

[Kitru]

It'll likely bring the WAR enmity per GCD down to a more sane number.

As it turns out, the "sane number" is less than what PLD manages. Go further support for WAR being near-universally sub-par (and the one thing it does well being only slightly better than PLD)!

[HiirNoivl]

I had to see that unless there is a severe uptick in damage dealt while holding IB and HP cured by using IB, WAR has issues with both it's main tasks, dealing damage and healing himself.

STR and VIT can only get you so far. If you stacked VIT then you would not have enough strength to deal damage and heal yourself effectively. WAR made and geared this way would always be inferior to PLD because it's not doing damage, nor can he heal himself. AT best he can hold hate and take damage while all the mitigation was shifted onto the mages who then would rage quit from all the burden. Or suicide by hate pull.

On the other hand, stacking STR left you unable to take many hits even if you could cure yourself okay... but even then the cures were not that great and the damage was not that effective EVEN THEN.

So if you balanced STR and VIT you would have a cushion of HP... but not a large one and your STR would cure a greater percentage of HP but... you weren't doing THAT much more damage than a PLD. Still not enough.

I tried to go the Skill Speed Route. But that wasn't exactly effective all the time. I couldn't get my cooldowns down low enough to see a difference unless it was under special circumstances.... too special actually. So I had to abandon that route.

So I know I could do a lot of good self heals on a Crit though... but could Crit Rate ever be raised high enough to make a difference? At launch the Devs put a buff on Wrath Crit Rate and so I decided to try.

After nibbling on the bait and using the Malignant Mog Axe (+20 Crit) instead of my Bravura and making some cheap Preliminary melds on HQ jewelry I took my weird looking set into Garuda for testing and I was astounded by the results. Not only was I hitting criticals like mad but I was critting regularly on Inner Beast. Heck, even Blood Bath became worth while as my Auto attacks popped crits more often than my WS.

Encouraged I changed my melds from Skill Speed to Crit Rate and ate some Apkallu Omellette. The results were a Crit Rate of 33 percent over all. DPS went from 80 on average to 93 Without much particular effort.

TLDR: It seems to me that WARs should go STR>VIT>Crit and skip skillspeed all together. You have to have STR, you have to have VIT and you have to have Crit to play this...

This is my preliminary opinion. I don't know how much or the whole whys of the situation. I just know that my job just got a heck of a lot easier.