Connecting the DoTs: A Summoner Guide

[Griffey]

Same question over and over

What? I have literally answered your first question twice already. go back and read!

To answer your second question, if your tank is picking up large groups you can afford to use a DWT every mob. It's only if they take one group at a time that you will find yourself twiddling your thumbs waiting for aetherflow to come back up.

As for your rotation on trash mobs I like to use painflare when they are grouped, then either hard cast the dots or use tri disaster, contagion, then bane the group. Follow up with a swift cast shadow flare, another pain flare and go into DWT. From here you can spam ruin 3 to whittle down the mobs, or, if there are 5 targets or more, it's actually a dps gain to use blizzard 2 and hit them all. end with death flare and the trash should be dead or very close to.

Pro tip: macro Painflare and Aerial Slash on the same button if you are struggling with pet micro management.

[ElasmoFan]

What? I have literally answered your first question twice already. go back and read!

You mentioned you spread out your festers, what I was curious about in that post is if it matters how much you spread them out or as long as you have your 3 stacks by the time aetherflow / tri disaster is up for DWT then you're fine. I feel like I might just be overthinking all of this (been sick the last several days so I've had a lot of time to think and not so much to play around lol).
Sorry for sounding like a broken record, never had an easy time getting my point or questions across very well. Thank you all for your help as well, really trying to be a good summoner. >.<

[Neela]

As for your rotation on trash mobs I like to use painflare when they are grouped, then either hard cast the dots or use tri disaster, contagion, then bane the group. Follow up with a swift cast shadow flare, another pain flare and go into DWT. From here you can spam ruin 3 to whittle down the mobs, or, if there are 5 targets or more, it's actually a dps gain to use blizzard 2 and hit them all. end with death flare and the trash should be dead or very close to.

Pro tip: macro Painflare and Aerial Slash on the same button if you are struggling with pet micro management.

my trash mob rotation looks similar i use painflare > insta shadowflare > tri (macroed with con), bane (macroed with areal), painflare > DWT > mia ll > ruinspam > deathflare. i'll never thought about macro aerial with pain instead of bane... maybe ill give it a try....

@Elas
talking about timing for aether/dwt too much won't help you to become a good smn - i guess you get the point Griffey and i are trying to clear up. its about experience and situational knowledge. last thing to say is trying to get in dwt-burst mode should be the goal as fast as possible without letting your dots run out. i won't think about the timing between the first 2 stacks – the important part of the timing is the last one so you actually have 30s from the 2nd to 3rd stack and another 15s on dwt as well - in a nut shell its all about to make the best of those 45s and keeping the flow.