DRK is going to be Nerfed in Stormblood

[SyzzleSpark]

I don't see this being corrected since your post but I could have missed that.

I actually agree to an extent that BN usage is a dps loss, outside of grit. For the cost of DA, you get 380 potency, at the sacrifice of pushing all your skills a gcd ahead. This means for every 3 BN's, you lose an entire soul eater combo for the cost of 3 DA's, as you stated earlier.

I do feel if you're in Grit, this would be an increase to an extent. However, this will push syphon strike further away allowing less mp regeneration over the duration of an encounter.

380 is still greater than the average PPGCD of an unbuffed Souleater combo, even factoring in SS's MP return. BN is only a DPS loss if it doesn't break.

Even if you factor the half-DA that SS returns as more than 70 potency (averaging between the 350 increase for C&S) it still only comes out to 340 PPGCD. A BS attained through any means at all is always a DPS gain even factoring in delaying the combo, with the sole exception of a scenario in which it leaves you without MP for C&S.

150+250+280=680
680/3=226
2400MP=140pot
1200MP=70pot
226+70=296
380>296

2400MP=(140pot+350pot/2)=245
1200MP=122.5
226+122.5=348.5
380>348.5

If you consider 2400 MP as strictly a C&S:
350/2=175
226+175=401

So if C&S is coming off cooldown and casting BN to get a BS will rob you of the MP to DA it, this is the only time that BN or BS are ever a DPS loss.

If you factor in these DA/SS potencies prior to the PPGCD average, these numbers are even more damning to the idea that BN is a DPS loss. Its a gain. Outside of Grit. Inside Grit, its even more of a gain.

No idea if all this + the Darkside buff is going to make up for the other stuff they gutted from us like Reprisal/LB/Scourge but I am hopeful.

[Falar]

Surely it won't, considering the revert back to STR only along with now being locked to VIT accessories.

[Daniel_Fury]

150+250+280=680
680/3=226
2400MP=140pot
1200MP=70pot
226+70=296
380>296

2400MP=(140pot+350pot/2)=245
1200MP=122.5
226+122.5=348.5
380>348.5

If you consider 2400 MP as strictly a C&S:
350/2=175
226+175=401

So if C&S is coming off cooldown and casting BN to get a BS will rob you of the MP to DA it, this is the only time that BN or BS are ever a DPS loss.

No idea if all this + the Darkside buff is going to make up for the other stuff they gutted from us like Reprisal/LB/Scourge but I am hopeful.

If you're not using grit, it works out as a 10 potency loss per BN+BS used together.
3* 380 = 1140 potency.

For a SE combo:
680+ 420 (3 dark arts (mp saved on not using BN)) + 70 (Syphon Strike)= 1170 potency.

You can also argue that by using SE combo, you generate 1/5th of a natural bloodspiller. That's roughly 74 potential potency.

[SyzzleSpark]

680+ 420 (3 dark arts (mp saved on not using BN)) + 70 (Syphon Strike)= 1170 potency.

The bolded part makes no sense because if you had that MP but were not using BN you would use it on SS or SE or both; you can't count that MP in favor of one but not the other. Its about GCD potency and whether delaying SE actually hurts your DPS, which it doesn't. If you had that MP to spend, you would spend it. There is no saving MP on DRK, unless its for C&S, which I factored in my calculations and it still didn't make SE's PPGCD better than BS.

To put it more directly, MP potency isn't an issue, because if its strictly MP potency that we're addressing, a broken BN shield's MP potency is 380, whereas those 3 DAs you "saved" only have 140 a piece over x number of DA-able GCDs. So the question is whether the delaying of the GCDs for that 380 potency is a loss over continuing with the SE combos. The MP you're saying was saved isn't a net gain, it just gets spent on another source, lest you cap out.

Naturally generated BS is certainly a gain, and I'm not seeing the math that says BN-generated BS is not a gain as well. That's not to say it should be spammed, but I think holding it when you know the shield will be broken were you to cast it is inefficient.

[Daniel_Fury]

The bolded part makes no sense because if you had that MP but were not using BN you would use it on SS or SE or both; you can't count that MP in favor of one.

If you can always guarantee that you'll be able to DA SS, SE, C&S and even pop DP on the cases that you don't have slashing up, I would consider the BN a dps gain otherwise you can bank it and even use it on natural Bloodspillers or those moments you didn't have mp to dark arts your GCDs for increased damage over the encounter.

Even at a 10 potency loss, it's still worth using on cd providing it will break imo as 10 potency trade for a 10% shield is a tiny cost.

[Reynhart]

3* 380 = 1140 potency.

For a SE combo:
680+ 420 (3 dark arts (mp saved on not using BN)) + 70 (Syphon Strike)= 1170 potency.

There is still a big flaw in that calculation. To use 3 Dark Arts, you have to do more than one combo, thus, spending 2 GCD on Hard Slash, wich completely kills your average potency.

[Daniel_Fury]

There is still a big flaw in that calculation. To use 3 Dark Arts, you have to more than one combo, thus, spending 2 GCD on Hard Slash, wich completely kills your average potency.

If you were to finish a 10 minute fight, and look at all your skills used and saw that you used blackest night 3 times and 3 blood spillers as a result but then saw you didn't use dark arts on 3 gcd or ogcds in the fight, factor in the fact you also could of used the entire souleater combo instead of those bloodspillers, then you would see that you lost damage.

The problem is that you expect 3 dark arts to be used in 3 gcds for the calculations to make sense, but mp is a resource that can increase dps. You can save it for later.

If a fight finishes and there's more blackest nights used over missed dark arts opportunities, then the damage loss is there.

[Reynhart]

If you were to finish a 10 minute fight, and look at all your skills used and saw that you used blackest night 3 times and 3 blood spillers as a result but then saw you didn't use dark arts on 3 gcd or ogcds in the fight, factor in the fact you also could of used the entire souleater combo instead of those bloodspillers, then you would see that you lost damage.

That's overly simple.
Did you use Blackest Night to not activate Grit ?
Would you have used these Blackest Night to mitigates tankbusters anyway ?
How much time did you spend in Grit, bumping the effective potency of BloodSpiller when compated to SoulEater ?

And again, 3 basic Bloodspillers give a better average potency that one full powered SoulEater combo.

[Daniel_Fury]

That's overly simple.
Did you use Blackest Night to not activate Grit ?
Would you have used these Blackest Night to mitigates tankbusters anyway ?
How much time did you spend in Grit, bumping the effective potency of BloodSpiller when compated to SoulEater

Read Lyths post above. It explains what I'm trying to explain in a much better format with easier to understand calculations.

It is quite simple, you're just simply over complicating things.

We are speaking about why you lose dps for using TBN over DA and how blood spiller doesn't quite cover the damage potential that you lost. The reason for using the TBN does not play a part in it.

I'd personally use TBN on a MT every tank buster whether it is a dps loss or not. The skill seems to be designed so that you will use it as an OT but if it increased damage it would be overpowered. The cost for using it is not too much and the benefit outweighs the damage loss in my eyes.

[Lyth]

I think that they did a fantastic job of resolving the dps disparity found amongst PLDs of different skill levels. Now, if you fall asleep during GB RAx2, it's no longer counted as a dps loss as long as you pass out on to the Holy Spirit button. Let us remember our fallen brethren, Requiescat in pace.

But enough banter. Let's do some math.

...

This calculation shows why natural Bloodsplitters are a dps gain (there's a slight technical error in that the 0.5DA term should be averaged across 3 GCDs, but it doesn't really change the outcome). The problem is that TBN costs an additional DA on top of this (i.e. an extra 140 potency needs to be accounted for).

Let's do this formally.

1 DA is worth 140 potency.

If Bloodsplitter truncates one Hard Slash, then we have:
50 blood = 380 potency - 150 potency
50 blood = 230 potency

If Bloodsplitter truncates one Siphon Strike, then we have:
50 blood = 380 potency - 250 potency - 0.5 DA
50 blood = 130 potency - 0.5(140 potency)
50 blood = 60 potency

If Bloodsplitter truncates one Souleater, then we have
50 blood = 380 potency - 280 potency - 10 blood
60 blood = 100 potency
50 blood = 83 potency

So no matter what GCD we lose, Bloodsplitter is always a dps gain when it occurs naturally. If we activate TBN to gain 50 blood, however, we're spending 1 DA worth of MP to gain this 50 blood. So we're spending 140 potency to gain 230 potency on Hard Slash, 60 potency on Siphon Strike, and 83 potency on Souleater.

More generally, if we use 3 Bloodsplitters to truncate one entire Souleater combo, then we have:
150 blood = 3(380 potency) - (150 + 250+ 280 potency) - 0.5DA - 10 blood
160 blood = (1140 potency) - (680 potency) - 0.5(140 potency)
160 blood = 390 potency
50 blood = 121 potency

So we've proven that natural Bloodsplitters are always a dps gain. But 121 potency is less than the value of 1 DA, so using TBN to gain a Bloodsplitter is a dps loss. With some simple algebra, you can also show that in order for using TBN on Bloodsplitter to be a dps gain, the base potency of Bloodsplitter needs to be 400.

Now this is where it gets really interesting. Delirium gives you 1 DA worth of MP in addition to the Blood Weapon/Price buff extension. Because you're gaining at least 140 potency in exchange for 50 blood, it is always a dps gain to spend your blood on Delirium over Bloodsplitter. In addition, if that blood comes from TBN, then you're spending 1 DA to gain back an equal if not greater amount of MP. So if you use TBN to pay the cost of Delirium, it's a dps gain.

As a result, you get one "free" use of TBN every time Delirium comes up, once every two minutes. That's the reason for why our defensive cooldowns are designed the way they are, at the moment. The interactions between the four new skills is really interesting. Bloodspiller's potency can't go much higher without making TBN free and spammable. Delirium's recast controls how often TBN can be used defensively without penalty, and gaining more usages out of it than this limit results in lost dps. Really neat stuff.