How to Dragoon per Second: A DPS Paradigm

[Greyfrost]

e: A4S down, now I can resume life \o/

A big congratulations, and I'm starting savage soon-ish, once I get past the entry test for this group...

I wanna join the big boys :c.

Did you get any weapon upgrade/trident on A4S?

[Baa]

Is 2.40s GCD really needed?

I have 588 SkS (2.41s GCD) and my HTs are buffing themselves. I think this is because damage is determined when starting the GCD, while the HT buff applies after more than a second into the GCD, making it effectively last a little over 25s.

I just experimented with 2.47s GCD and HT still buffs itself. Of course, double-weaving and/or lag makes this too risky, but 2.40s appears to be excessive.

[Greyfrost]

Is 2.40s GCD really needed?

I have 588 SkS (2.41s GCD) and my HTs are buffing themselves. I think this is because damage is determined when starting the GCD, while the HT buff applies after more than a second into the GCD, making it effectively last a little over 25s.

I just experimented with 2.47s GCD and HT still buffs itself. Of course, double-weaving and/or lag makes this too risky, but 2.40s appears to be excessive.

What kind of rotation are you doing? Mind to elaborate it a little bit more?

[Baa]

What kind of rotation are you doing? Mind to elaborate it a little bit more?

The same one detailed on the first page.
The reasoning for 2.40s GCD is to make sure HT doesn't drop, letting it buff the next HT:
HT(2.4s used up here) --> 9 other GCDs using up remaining 21.6s of buff --> HT again on the dot

But HT applies ~1s into its own GCD:
HT(~1.4s used up here) --> 9 other GCDs using up 21.6s of buff --> ~1s leeway to HT again

[Greyfrost]

The same one detailed on the first page.
The reasoning for 2.40s GCD is to make sure HT doesn't drop, letting it buff the next HT:
HT(2.4s used up here) --> 9 other GCDs using up remaining 21.6s of buff --> HT again on the dot

But HT applies ~1s into its own GCD:
HT(~1.4s used up here) --> 9 other GCDs using up 21.6s of buff --> ~1s leeway to HT again

On the bigger picture, it's easier to manage BotD and GSK timing with more skill speed, let's not forget that we have another timer that we need to manage.

Imo 2.4s is needed to do the "Optimum" rotation. The magic number has perfect synergy with all the skills DRG currently have, for now.

[Baa]

On the bigger picture, it's easier to manage BotD and GSK timing with more skill speed, let's not forget that we have another timer that we need to manage.

Imo 2.4s is needed to do the "Optimum" rotation. The magic number has perfect synergy with all the skills DRG currently have, for now.

Wouldn't having less SkS actually help with that? Some people are running into problems having to wait on BotD after VT with Selene/expanded arrow.
Using 2.44s for example, would take 1s more to execute 25 GCDs ie. when BotD is refreshed.

[JackFross]

Wouldn't having less SkS actually help with that? Some people are running into problems having to wait on BotD after VT with Selene/expanded arrow.
Using 2.44s for example, would take 1s more to execute 25 GCDs ie. when BotD is refreshed.

I run with a 2.40 or 2.39 gcd, have been since I started Savage. I hit BotD on cooldown; it literally comes off cooldown between VT and FT (or Dis and CT) every time I re-up it. When I do 4-5m parses on dummies, too, I pull it up at those exact times. It's never delayed. Selene only impacts that in raid setting, where most of the time downtime and mechanics will muck up your 3 gsk per minute anyway. I run with a SCH who uses Selene and I never run into issues of BotD coming back late outside of A3S, where it comes back ~1s too late the way I do it to re-up it before CT. I hold my GCD there to do it, and have been ending hand phase at around 1300 dps at i199, so meh?

I've run with AST too who like to spam Arrow on me. It doesn't impact you nearly as much as you'd think. Mechanics and other things make it a lot less of an issue than you think it would be. Higher SS allows for more margin of error.

If all of those words don't convince you, let me share something with you to illustrate an important point:
http://puu.sh/kefrn/1d2d9601b8.png

That second gsk. When you use it at 2.4 gcd, you have approximately 2.2 seconds of grace. What that means is you could have up to ~1.5-1.7s of downtime off the boss with this much ss and still hit your 3 gsk per minute. You have a full second less grace period if you have a 2.44 gcd. Every piece of content worth noting (including, but not limited to latency) forces downtime. Sometimes minor (A1S dragging adds around, you sometimes have small pockets of GCDs sitting not spun) and other times pretty major (A3S has tethers that force you to stop attacking for a relatively long period of time). Bigger grace windows means less chance of your BotD dropping off. It means more gsk per minute. It means more dps in the long run than low ss will ever manage to get you by way of boosting crit or det.

[SunnyHirose]

I tried to find some gearsets manually, seeing as to how stat weights keep making it weird. After fixing a frankly embarrassing error in my model (crit buffs were being counted twice for auto-attacks, but only in one of the testbeds...), the best A4S BiS simulation I've gotten so far is the set Aiurily posted--http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/RL7Z (estimated average 1493 DPS). If you don't mind accuracy food, it's a good one.

But I do mind accuracy food, so, now that I'm not spending every evening trying to beat the fight, I'll try my hand at writing software to do a more exhaustive search....

Did you get any weapon upgrade/trident on A4S?

Nope. Since we're still looking at odd edge cases where either spear might be BiS, I was okay with holding off. We gave the gobdip to the monk (eso weapon: major crit, minor ss; alex weapon: major ss, minor det... so anyhoo, pretty clear which one's BiS).

I hold my GCD there to do it, and have been ending hand phase at around 1300 dps at i199, so meh?

Avoid holding GCDs just to get the Geirskogul in under a minute. GCDs contribute more than 10 times the potency of Geirskoguls. Better to just stretch it to 3 / 84 seconds than slow down the pain train.

[enil]

The same one detailed on the first page.
The reasoning for 2.40s GCD is to make sure HT doesn't drop, letting it buff the next HT:
HT(2.4s used up here) --> 9 other GCDs using up remaining 21.6s of buff --> HT again on the dot

But HT applies ~1s into its own GCD:
HT(~1.4s used up here) --> 9 other GCDs using up 21.6s of buff --> ~1s leeway to HT again

2.4s isn't needed to have HT buff itself because of animation/debuff/buff delay and how attacks snapshot on the start of the attack, though when you are over 2.40 there is a slight delay where HT will drop and any oGCD's or autoattacks in that brief period may not have the HT buff - I'm not sure this is really worth getting the SS as well. For people with bad ping the extra SS helps maintain the HT buffed HT when double weaving or if jumps eat into your GCD.

[Baa]

Having greater leeway for Gsk is a good justification, and I will continue aiming for 2.40s.
My original question, though, was whether 2.40s was really *needed*. The guide emphasises this in bold, underlined text. Yet 2 posts up we see a BiS set with 579 SkS.
When new DRGs come along and read the guide, will they drop ilvls or delay upgrades just to keep 590+ SkS, when they could do better with 2.41s or 2.42s?
I suppose all this doesn't matter outside of savage anyway.