(Help me out!) How to get over 200 dps on Titan Exteme?

[NyneAlexander]

couple pointers that helped me:

1.) save your swiftcast for flare. you can usually hard cast t3 at the beginning of each phase before he gets into mechanics, and then use T1 when your in umbral ice

2.) every time you move, use scathe. this may take a fire spell off of your fire chain but...

3.) don't worry about losing a fire spell off of your fire chain. Unless you are 100% perfect and other dps in your pt are consistent, chances are you aren't going to finish your fire chains all the time due to jumps, goals, etc.

4.) your dps will increase when the jailers spawn. if you are parsing in real time, don't be discouraged.

5.) I usually use raging for my first fire chain, and then again after gaols in the heart phase. Save quelling for the egis. Also your 3rd raging and 2nd quelling should both be off of cooldown for the 2nd set of egis.

Hope that helps. Employing these tactics helped get me from 175ish dps to 235+ consistently.

[NyneAlexander]

Also... dps is going to fluctuate alot in this fight. Don't let someone start talking smack on your dps output when you were the one in the gaol the last 3 times.

[Viridiana]

That's exactly why I disagree with people posting parse results. I won't parse anyone, nor have I ever used the program. I know if I'm playing right and I can observe others and see if they are playing wrong.

You can watch 5 other people do their rotations in real time and see if they're messing up any part of it, all while maintaining your proper rotation and not messing up any mechanics, on a hectic fight like Titan EX?

[Remn]

on a hectic fight like Titan EX?,
don't know about you but for me Titan Xm is the most simple fight of the 3. you know what coming and when it coming. if you wan hectic, please try doin iffit Xm with pug healer, make me pull my hair out 60% of the time><

[NeoAmon]

I just did a quick Titan Ex PUG kill:

http://imgur.com/wHy1Qdu

Nothing as impressive as a SMN but it got the job done. It is possible to do more.

Edit: I guess if you add my pet damage I would score higher than a SMN ^^.

[Ryuko]

To respond to the people who responded to me: I wasn't just talking about me seeing if people can dodge or not when I said I don't need to use a parser. I am watching what others are casting/using, too. Just seeing the total numbers doesn't help me know what the problem is... just that there is a problem. But, watching them helps me realize what they are doing wrong, if they are using the wrong rotation, etc. It's pretty easy to watch... and not hard to watch in titan extreme because every single move is 'predictable'. Also, when people do parse... I am told I am usually one of the top if not the top, so I know I'm not doing anything wrong... but then again, I knew that before people started going crazy with parsers. I don't care if I'm number one or number two... just that I'm getting the job done and being the best player I can be. It's just common sense. If you want to use parsers on a dummy to help someone learn or practice their rotation... that's another story.

Sometimes you get lucky with crits or not, and there's your variable for good players... but you'll be able to tell if someone is using the wrong rotation simply from watching them. Unfortunately, I don't know melee dps well (I haven't leveled one) so I cannot be as critical with those roles. I do, however, watch all casters and bards to see what they are doing... and it is pretty easy to see if what they are doing is right or wrong.

Anyway, another reason I am against parsers: there are so many fights where they simply won't be a good reflection of how well a player is playing... most particularly with fights involving a lot of adds or dodging. Turn 4, Twintania, Titan Extreme, Garuda Extreme... all these fights are hard to 'parse' because so much is going on at once, and different jobs are optimal for different sections of the fight. There are certain little tricks in all of these fights that will make you more effective... and that just isn't raw damage. That's experience and knowledge.

One example I'll give is how I treat conflags and jails in Titan ex: I get my dots ready, bane them onto the add, and fester. The damage is effective and helpful, but would my damage be better if I just used my festers on cooldown rather than timing them for those moments? Probably... but to me it doesn't matter because parsers can't show who is playing smarter... just who is doing the most raw, parsed damage. This is why I watch other people... Let's say there is another summoner in the fight, and he is out-dpsing me... but only because he is using fester on cooldown rather than using it at optimal moments. He never banes or festers the jails (this actually happened in a titan group I was in, and I noticed it because I was watching him). Then we start to have issues with adds because he isn't saving his cooldowns for the right moment. That's why I'm saying using parsers as the end-all be-all of how good a player is... is a BAD idea. Instead, I watch what is going on and give advice.

You can watch 5 other people do their rotations in real time and see if they're messing up any part of it, all while maintaining your proper rotation and not messing up any mechanics, on a hectic fight like Titan EX?

How is this fight hectic? I have it down to a science because the fight is a science, and yes I maintain my rotation because it's easy. Everything is so well-timed and Titan always follows the same rotation. I don't watch five people at once... I watch one or two (doing their rotations if I feel they are bringing the group down), but I will notice if any player dodges in the wrong direction or goes to the wrong place. Perhaps it's an old habit from playing WHM only in 1.0 -- I am always watching the party bar in addition to what I am doing, and dodging with my peripherals. I've been doing this fight for weeks helping people learn the fight... I call out abilities before they happen for new players, so yes I can maintain my proper dps and still watch others. I'm surprised people are challenging me on this because I assumed anyone would be able to do this if they have the fight memorized.

[NeoAmon]

^ so going by feelings is better than parsing?

You are not making sense. It is a tool, I agree it should not be checked during the fight because that is just distracting but after successful kill or fail, it is a good method to identity strength and weakness. Now days it is fairly accurate if there is no double jobs in the same party.

[Ryuko]

^ so going by feelings is better than parsing?

You are not making sense. It is a tool, I agree it should not be checked during the fight because that is just distracting but after successful kill or fail, it is a good method to identity strength and weakness. Not others, but at least yourself.

How am I going by feelings if I see what they are doing precisely?

If you want to run a parser yourself... by all means, go ahead. Who am I to stop you? But using it as a tool to determine 'who is the better dps' when the numbers are heavily influenced by the type of fight it is (for example SMN versus BLM in Titan Ex)... that is going way too far. As I said, it is pretty easy to see if someone is a good player or not just by watching their actions... and just because their total damage or average dps is lower than others doesn't mean they don't have a place in the fight. That is the point I'm trying to make. I see many BLM excluded from this fight because "they can't do as much damage." Meanwhile, they do have uses during certain phases (they are beastly on superbombs for example). Even I admitted I try not to take more than one BLM, though, because they might have trouble setting up for the 2nd jail (after being pushed back). Too many people get pigeonholed into thinking the numbers are better than anything else, and that is why I dislike parsers in general. It is very clear by this point that SE sets up certain situations in a fight where some classes are more optimal than others, thus pushing you to avoid class stacking unless you GREATLY outgear the fight. By looking at raw damage alone, you are overlooking the individual strengths/weaknesses of each section of a phase. I don't mean you directly... I mean a lot of people who choose to use parsers and don't understand how each class works. I've seen it happen so many times.

[Viridiana]

Sometimes you get lucky with crits or not, and there's your variable for good players... but you'll be able to tell if someone is using the wrong rotation simply from watching them. Unfortunately, I don't know melee dps well (I haven't leveled one) so I cannot be as critical with those roles. I do, however, watch all casters and bards to see what they are doing... and it is pretty easy to see if what they are doing is right or wrong.

This is basically what I was getting at with my posts, and I think we actually agree for the most part. Yes, it's easy to watch the cast bars of mages to see what they're casting, and certain attack animations are pretty clear-cut to see if they're being spammed (appropriately or not), but I find it much harder to gauge melee dps performance mid-fight.

Take a Titan EX group I had the other night. After a wipe or two, I checked the parser. The MNK was barely beating the tanks. So, I decided to pay more attention to what was going on with him through the fight, noticed that the DK debuff was never going up on Titan. As the group fell apart after the last wipe, I asked him, and he said he was using it. Checked the parser again, he was never using Snap Punch at all. There's no way I could have told that without a parser, though. Not mid-fight, anyway.

Important to note, though, that I don't mean to immediately judge someone for low dps. Could be an entirely legitimate reason for it. Or they could just have a really bad rotation. It's easier to determine if you both pay attention *and* run a parser. More tools (as long as they're accurate) leads to better decisions, I think.