Black Mage Sanctuary - A Guide to DPS

[Kabooa]

T

This is more of a heads up that if you want to min/max this, it's not completely trivial and not as simple as "does it last thru AF".

The 12s bit I believe was primarily for 'When Tcloud'. It was the break even point where Tcloud could clip into T3 without being less potency than F4, which at the time was 504 instead of 468.

[Ferrinus]

Well, B4 is like a spell that deals 728 damage and has a 5.6s cast time, so 130pps or 325pgcd. If Thundercloud procs didn't exist, a T3 would have to do 325 total potency to be at least as good as B4, meaning it would have to tick more than 6 times, meaning you'd need to be adding at least 21 seconds. This suggests that, if you're the world's unluckiest BLM who never gets TC procs, you'd want to only recast Thunder 3 on an enemy that has a ~3 second DoT or worse remaining on it.

For a definitive answer we'd need to model the expected PPS from not just adding DoT ticks to an enemy but increasing your chances of getting a thundercloud proc.

[Waliel]

Well, B4 is like a spell that deals 728 damage and has a 5.6s cast time, so 130pps or 325pgcd.

I'm having really hard time imagining how you're getting that. Double B4 based on time was my first thought, but the damage is almost three casts.

B3+F4. Duh.

Would it be too crazy to think it like this:

Fresh T3 has ~56,95% chance of TC so ~404 TC damage minus remaining DOT.
12s T3 has ~34,39% chance of TC so ~244 TC damage + remaining DOT.

So something like this with quick excel:

TC F4 F4 B3 Foul T3 B4 Fire rota + "TC avg" = 165.62 PPS (0s TC avg) to 155.92 (2.5s TC avg)
TC F4 F4 B3 Foul B4 Fire rota + "TC avg" = 166.26 PPS (0s TC avg) to 155.93 (2.5s TC avg)

I've no idea if there's any logic behind my Logic(tm).

[Ferrinus]

I'm just trying to find the breakpoint at which B4 and T3 even out. So let's say that you're a moderately unlucky BLM - you only ever get your TC procs immediately (so even if you hold them as long as you can, you're forced to clip half an existing DoT when you burn them off) and your TC procs don't get TC procs of their own.

On a fresh target, T3 deals 390 potency/2.5sec 43% of the time, and 230 + 710 = 940 potency/5sec the other 57% of the time. That's 174 pps, obviously better than B4.

On a target that has, say, 12s of Thunder left, T3 adds 230 potency/2.5sec 66% of the time, and adds 70 + 710 = 780 potency/5sec the other 34% of the time. 60.7 + 51.5 = 116.2, worse than B4's 130. However, that's making a bunch of assumptions in B4's favor - in actual play, plenty of procs come late enough in an existing Thunder DoT that you can clip fewer than 12 seconds when discharging them, and your TC procs can generate TC procs themselves, etc.

Then again, I'm not taking into account the odds of the 12s target generating a TC proc all by its lonesome. So let's say that you choose to cast B4 on a monster with 12s of Thunder left on it and swap straight back to astral:

66% of the time, you just deal B4's 130pps. But 34% of the time, you deal B4's total 728 over 5.6sec, but ALSO deal a TC proc's 710 over 2.5sec, for a total of 1438 over 8.1 seconds. 85.8 + 60.4 = 146.2 pps. So maybe it's a good idea to allow an existing 12sec thunder dot expend itself rather than overwrite it with a hardcast. It's also possible that the way I'm taking weighted averages of different pps-es that last for different durations is totally wrong on its face, but it's late at night and I'm just thinking aloud before going to bed.

[Terkhev]

A question about AoE rotation before 68: how? On 4 or more targets I'd just keep thunder up, F2 few times then flare and transpose. But on 3 targets it gets a bit complicated. Before lvl 60 F2 was better than F1 on 3 targets, but with F4 it isn't. I tried to do some quick calculations:
(I skip thunder coz it's obviously used same in all cases)
F3 -> Flare -> transpose = 129,0 p/s, but is too short to transpose every time
F3 -> F4 -> Flare -> transpose = 118,7 p/s

What to do in umbral? With only 1 stack if I instantly jump back to astral it doesn't leave me with much mana to consider other options. If I don't get T procs and don't need to refresh it, I don't have transpose ready.

[Waliel]

A question about AoE rotation before 68: how? On 4 or more targets I'd just keep thunder up, F2 few times then flare and transpose. But on 3 targets it gets a bit complicated. Before lvl 60 F2 was better than F1 on 3 targets, but with F4 it isn't. I tried to do some quick calculations:
(I skip thunder coz it's obviously used same in all cases)
F3 -> Flare -> transpose = 129,0 p/s, but is too short to transpose every time
F3 -> F4 -> Flare -> transpose = 118,7 p/s

What to do in umbral? With only 1 stack if I instantly jump back to astral it doesn't leave me with much mana to consider other options. If I don't get T procs and don't need to refresh it, I don't have transpose ready.

You go either T4 F3 F4 Flare Trans or F3 F4 F4 Flare trans depending if you need to refresh Thunder. F3 F4 Flare is too short.

[VitalSuit]

You go either T4 F3 F4 Flare Trans or F3 F4 F4 Flare trans depending if you need to refresh Thunder. F3 F4 Flare is too short.

Isn't F2 stronger than F4 on 4+ targets?

[Waliel]

Isn't F2 stronger than F4 on 4+ targets?

It is, but they were asking about 3 mobs pre-68. B4 F3 Flare Flare is also better than using F2 for 3-5 enemies and you drop B4 completely on 9+.

[Finkledoodoo]

Any idea what the blm bis is and the materia for it?

[Llugen]

In short achieve 1917 sps and then dh det crit from there