My BLM DPS seems lower than it should be

[Poponori]

Hello all. So, I main a black mage, and I'm trying to get as good as I can with it, but, despite all my efforts, I seem to be doing only 1400 dps on the Stone, Sky, Sea totems, compared to BLMs of similar ilvls (I'm at 211 right now) doing around 1600. Granted, I can't guarantee they're not using food and int pots, despite at least one saying they're not.

Here's what I currently do for a rotation, minus pots:
Opener: Sharp + Ley, F3, RS + Enoch, F1, F4x3, F3, F4x2, B3, T1, B4
Rotation: F3, F4x2, F1, F4x2, (procs if enochian time allows), B3, T1 (T3 if on proc), B4

Can anyone see any red flags in what I'm doing? I feel like even if the opening is off, it shouldn't be dropping my DPS by almost 200 over 3 minutes, and as far as I can tell, the regular rotation is pretty standard.

Thanks!

[Aurelle_Delacroix]

I pretty much do the same rotation however in the opener, I do Fire IV x3, the FS proc, Convert, another Fire IV x3, etc.

So, I do 6 fire IV where you only do 5. So that's certainly something that is a dps loss. As for the rest, I don't know. So far I've cleared everything in Stone, Sea, Sky just fine so I'm not sure what else to tell you.

[Poponori]

Oh, right, my bad. When convert is up I do indeed do the 6x opener. 4xF4, F3 proc, convert, 2xF4.

[Arkenne]

Tis possible that the other BLMs are taking more adventage of the Thunderstorm procs too.
If you get Thunderstorm in you AF3 window, you can use it instead of a F4.

For example:
Lets say you are on UI3 in the middle of your rotation:
F3 > F4x3 > F1 was your plan
but then Thunderstorm proc happened at the first F4
you would go:
F3 > F4x2 > T3 > F1.
Time wise it is the same, so you wouldn't be risking losing AF3, the only tricky part is that you still have MP so be careful with your Enochian timing :v

(Note that, Thunder 3 proc needs 9 seconds to actually beat an AF3 F4 damage wise, so if you get it consecutively, try not to recast it on the same target unless its under 15 seconds, if you refresh the Thunder DoT before then, you are actually having a DPS loss in comparison to simply casting F4s).

[Poponori]

Alright, so since T3's ability to do more damage is based on how long it ticks for, how is that affected by thunder ticks almost always being up anyways? Usually if a T3 proc comes up during my AF phase, I still have time remaining on my thunder ticks, so besides the full damage up front from thundercloud, how is the 9 seconds of ticks from it adding damage?

[Rongway]

Thundercloud makes your thunder spells do their initial damage plus all their DoT at once, and then you still get the actual DoT. So for Thunder III, you get 70 initial, plus 8 ticks of 40 all at once, for a total initial hit of 390. Then, you get 8 ticks at 40 potency, for another 320 if it lasts the whole duration. A full duration Thundercloud III is 710 potency. But if you only get three ticks of it, it's the 390 initial hit plus 120 total DoT, or 510. This is more than the potency of an Astral Fire III buffed Fire IV, so as long as you get three ticks out of it, it's worth dropping Fire IV in favor of Thundercloud III.

Since all thunder spells tick for the same amount, you won't effectively increase the damage unless reapplying thunder would extend the duration by at least nine seconds.

[Waliel]

Do remember that even if nine seconds is the magical number, the later the better for TC usage is the way to go, if there's already any kind of Thunder ticking. T1/TC - 4 ticks - TC is more DPS than T1/TC - 3 ticks - TC even if the TC was technically better than single F4.

[FunkyBunch]

One thing is, there's enough time for an extra T3P in your openers if you start with B3-T1.
There's enough time to go:
B3-T1-Ley-Sharp-F3-RS-Eno-F4-F4-F1-F4-F4-F3P-T3P-Convert-F4-Swift-F4-B3-T1/B1 and still refresh enochian (at least with 850 SS).
You can jam the F4's together if you want, but it doesn't help get any more in there so doing it this way gives you more leeway to dodge mechanics without worrying about dropping AF3 or Enochian. At least not until you have enough MP and SS to get 5 in a row as F4x2+F1+F4x2 is better than just F4x4.

Under each Enochian, at 850 SS, there's always enough time for an extra Proc, sometimes two and you'll get to full MP and new Enochian right as you finish your third Enochian rotation with the extra time spent on Procs. (instead of a few seconds of underlap).

[Garotte14]

Snip

This is inaccurate. Assuming you're under Enochian, a TC with 3 ticks would equal 535.5 potency. A Fire IV would equal 529.2 potency. Yes, that TC is slightly more potent than the F4. But you're re not taking into consideration the previous T1 and the next T1. If you cast T1 in UI like normal for your filler, its potency will equal 283.5 potency. That's ticking 6 times. If you then use TC on say your second F4, you now cut that initial T1 down to 115.5 potency, plus refreshed Thunder to 24 seconds. Which means after you cast your B3, you still have 16 sec left on Thunder. Now what do you do as a filler? Thunder? Well then, your your 745.5 potent TC just became 493.5 potency which is lower than Fire IV. You could use a B1 instead and get the full potency out of TC, but unless you get another TC, it will fall off during your next rotation. My only point is, it's not that simple to just say TC is better than F4, cause that's not always the case.

[FunkyBunch]

SNIP.

It's always better than no spell though. If you have extra time, which I always seem to, there never seems to be a bad time to take the proc.
The only time it will be iffy, is if you are in the last Enochian phase, and by then it doesn't matter anyway. If you're leaving out an F4, which I used to advocate for, it's debatable when to pull the trigger on the T3P. But now with the insane spell speed, you may as well just take the free damage.