Sooo, I'm a little new to the concept in general, but to my understanding, it's basically a tool to record how much dps is done on a specific target. Yes? No? Feel free to elaborate.

Anyways, while I can see how they can be useful, I feel like the readings need to be taken with a grain of salt. I think it is especially true for this game as there are no official parsers for the game and they typically are unable to accurately record DoTs.

But of course, while using it, you need run multiple tests to look for consistency and you need to factor in things like: Where there adds? Was the DPS dead at any point? If yes, for how long? etc...

Again, just clarifying that I got this right.

Sooo, I've run into a couple people who use parsers RELIGIOUSLY. And not only that, that bash people hardcore when their numbers are off. "I'm a Paladin and I had a higher score than your Monk!"

Now, I'm looking at the dps my cookie-cutter DL Relic Paladin does (roughly 150-300ish per skill) and then comparing that to the dps my less-than full DL Relic Monk does (300+ with the exception of one or two skills), and the numbers just don't add up. The only way a Paladin would out-dps a Monk would be from the Monk not hitting the target as often, either from death or a lot of adds; there is a significant gear gap; or the Monk is awful at positioning and rotations.

But Monk is a poor example. I've seen similar complaints of this towards Black Mage and Bard! Please, my Bard averages a 250-300 per Heavy Shot alone (can't say much for Blm as I don't have one at that lvl. But pretty sure their dps is powerful). So even if the Bard didn't have his rotations down, he'd still land a lot more dps than the Paladin.

But I digress. Obviously, this is an extreme example of how not to use a parser. But I did want to get more insight on how these things work so that the next time someone comes to me with a biased report, I better explain what the score means for them.