Unchained. Seriously, why are we not abusing this skill?

[Syhrwyb]

gibberish

I don't even know what the hell this person is talking about.

[AaronHughes]

A5-7 savage can be done without using tank stance thanks to unchained and that's some of the hardest content in the game. Tanks regularly output 1000-1300 DPS even while handling mechanics. I can see how some people may be against the idea if they aren't overgeared for the fight but let me give you an example of why you may want to push for dps even in a mechanic-oriented group. A6s Blaster: Immediately after the first set of mirages, if Blaster isn't under 50% he will do two back to back tank busters which hurt even if you use a cooldown. Let's say your group plays it really safe during the dashes, ensuring nobody gets hit. Well this safe play results in blaster still being at 55% or so and you keep getting those tank busters consistently. Having both your tanks in DPS stance, using unchained, will allow you to push that extra 5% skipping those 2 tank busters and taking overall less damage. I think this is a practical example, since groups in i240 gear won't have that issue but groups doing progression will. There's no danger of the tanks losing aggro because Unchained just has make up the difference in dps between tanks and damage dealers, not eclipse the entire team's aggro generation. Tanks are still generating aggro while in dps stance, it doesn't just drop off into nothing.

[Sarcatica]

A5-7 savage can be done without using tank stance thanks to unchained and that's some of the hardest content in the game. Tanks regularly output 1000-1300 DPS even while handling mechanics. I can see how some people may be against the idea if they aren't overgeared for the fight but let me give you an example of why you may want to push for dps even in a mechanic-oriented group. A6s Blaster: Immediately after the first set of mirages, if Blaster isn't under 50% he will do two back to back tank busters which hurt even if you use a cooldown. Let's say your group plays it really safe during the dashes, ensuring nobody gets hit. Well this safe play results in blaster still being at 55% or so and you keep getting those tank busters consistently. Having both your tanks in DPS stance, using unchained, will allow you to push that extra 5% skipping those 2 tank busters and taking overall less damage. I think this is a practical example, since groups in i240 gear won't have that issue but groups doing progression will. There's no danger of the tanks losing aggro because Unchained just has make up the difference in dps between tanks and damage dealers, not eclipse the entire team's aggro generation. Tanks are still generating aggro while in dps stance, it doesn't just drop off into nothing.

99% of the progression groups advocate safe DPS-ing and all that, which to me adds to the fluff of the saying: "Play safe guys". Sometimes I just don't understand where that mentality came about. So you are advocating doing 400dps as a PLD in blaster that isn't going to go up sooner or later, even worse that your 4 DPS are not doing the standard level of their own DPS, which normally leads to having to deal with additional mechanics that usually just wipe the team over and over again.

It still is very dependent on the team you are in though, some teams just forbid pushing DPS because they just want to clear. A very different approach than what I actually like, which is to clear with optimization where I can afford to. /thumbsup to you.

[JackFross]

It still is very dependent on the team you are in though, some teams just forbid pushing DPS because they just want to clear. A very different approach than what I actually like, which is to clear with optimization where I can afford to. /thumbsup to you.

Actually something I deal with every raid night this tier. I joined a new group at the end of Gordias progression, and this new tier has just been... fun? I enjoy the fights, and I enjoy raiding with these guys, but all of my realistic ideas that inject no new or difficult additions to survival while affording us a gain to our raid DPS have just been completely discounted at the jump because the name of the game is focus on mechanics and don't worry about DPS.

I myself am the type of player who will go into an encounter and throw the kitchen sink at the boss out the gate, hitting everything on cooldown the first few pulls to see what sticks and what doesn't. It's really frustrating to then be in a group that says "the DPS checks are light this tier so focus on mechanics, not DPS" even after we literally killed A7S during enrage. Not during the cast - during the actual iteration of the wipe mechanic. Five people got killed by the final Sizzlespark before the boss died at 12:44. I did ~1570 in that kill, a solid 200 over the MCH in second place. If I DIDN'T focus mainly on DPS and optimizing it throughout the encounter, that would have been a wipe, straight up.

Frustrating, that mentality is. Progression isn't done by "playing it safe" - it's done by throwing your heads against the wall over and over in effort to optimize every situation to your advantage within as few failures as possible. You don't progress by actively telling the DPS to not do their job. You don't progress nearly as quickly by having tanks not even bother to try and do damage.


We're on A8S and making progress now, so it doesn't really bother me, like, at all. It's just an interesting real-world example of the difference in philosophy. I've dialed myself back and started focusing on mechanics more (hitting ~1600 on our recent kill and finally getting my gobdip) because I just want to progress at this point.