How to Dragoon Per Second: A DPS Paradigm

[Dervy]

snip

0.1s leeway for HT reapplication, not GK. Should of made it clearer. http://puu.sh/iE2XM/fafa65901c.png Column "C" is the duration remaining on HT when you successfully deal damage to your opponent. As you can see, C2 has 0.1s left on HT when you go and actually damage your opponent. Animation buff delay is awesome sometimes.

Your 2.5GCD GK usage is exactly the same as mine, there's absolutely 0 difference. I never said it was impossible to do so, it just requires a lot more management and "know-how", rather than a simple minded approach which works with 2.4GCD (which is listed on the OP). Well, I did kinda say it was impossible a few pages back... But I made a faulty assumption about 2.5GCD + GK, and I retract that statement. Should of double checked my model before hand.

Now. A fully looped cycle, including GK management lasts 122.5s. This is the point where your entire rotation starts from the beginning again and you're using BotD just before Chaos Thrust.

You can also use the same BotD layout for your 2.5GCD example, with 2.4GCD. So, to get a full loop with both of these, here's the duration and potencies.

2.5 GCD
Potency: 21175
Duration: 122.5s
PPS: 21175/122.5 = 172.8571

2.405 GCD (607ss/i180 geared)
Potency: 21102 (includes %chance to clip a DoT tick)
Duration:117.82
PPS: 21102/117.82 = 179.10371

Even with the DoT clips, the PPS is much higher at max i180 SS than it would be at 2.5GCD. If you get one unbuffed HT, it amounts to 28.05 Potency loss (170*0.15*1.1). That will definitely hurt your overall PPS if you continuously miss out on those and in a full 122.5s cycle, there's 5 HTs being used.

The next argument is something which Aiurily has tested at 2.4GCD. You can actually Pop BotD before Disembowel and use your Drac-Pot before Chaos Thrust. This results in you having a 104+ STR buffed 4th Tier after your Full Thrust, versus a Disembowel. This is significantly more damage. Unfortunately, my model doesn't allow me to calculate the additional Damage I'd gain from using a Drac-Pot during certain parts of the rotation, as my model is based on PPS...

My hard wired version comes out to it being a difference of around 30 DPS, give or take rounded numbers. It's hard to say what the exact number is as I believe SE have also changed some of the coefficients for Strength and Weapon Damage behind the scenes... This is the difference at 2.405 GCD, not a comparison between 2.5GCD, by the way.

As for how I calculated DoT clips before people get confused, I calculated a probability of you clipping a tick, whilst you have your DoT on your enemy. The closer you reapply your DoT to a value of 3, the greater the chance you have of clipping your DoT tick. The actual math I use is (DoT_Duration - Animation)/3. This will give me a percentage, which I multiply by one DoT tick, then subtract it from the overall DoT potency. It's an average, not an exact value, but it's good to calculate the average PPS.

So yes, the math does check out that at 2.405 GCD, you're doing significantly more PPS. As for the numerical DPS value (which we're all focused on...) we still need to figure out how Skillspeed affects DoT ticks, as well as Critical Hit Rating and how Determination scales Auto-Attacks. And you are correct, we don't know what Alexander Hardmode gear will look like.

But this is a guide for 3.0, not 3.01. Once Alexander Hits and we evaluate the gear differences, plus when we have more knowledge on Skillspeed, Crit and Determination, then we can make a lot more accurate and calculated assumptions for what the rotation will be like and of course, the guide will be updated for then.

But as I said previously, even if it is possible to get the rotation going with 2.5GCD, the numbers add up to the developers designing the rotation around 2.4 GCD. If Alexander gear is i180 and has more Determination, I could probably see us going down to 2.45 GCD, as gear is just absolutely loaded with Skillspeed at the moment.