Fine-Tuning PLD rotation - tips?

[Reynhart]

My rotation is as follows:
open with shield lob
Fast Blade - Spirits Within
Savage Blade - Fight or Flight
Rage of Halone - Circle of Scorn
Fast Blade - Bloodbath
into goring blade, then Royal Authority combos unless GB or RoH needs refreshing (for the healers)

Not sure if this has been mentioned before, but if the boss is using physical attacks, you can precast Sheltron to proc Shied Swipe at the beginning. The enmity it gives, combined with Shield Oath, could, at best, bypass your first RoH combo right into Goring Blade and, at worst, allow an opener with RA combo, since Savage Blade got a nice enmity boost.

On a sidenote, it should give better results to let the DRK MT to make the most of Blood Price and Reprisal.

Curious, but can you reference me to a good discussion thread on why not to use Fracture? It sounds intriguing.

Basically, Fracture has a 220 cumulative potency. The average potency on PLD's rotation is higher than that (Unless you spam RoH combo ). So, by using Fracture, you're decreasing your average potency per GCD.

[TenZer0]

Basically, Fracture has a 220 cumulative potency. The average potency on PLD's rotation is higher than that (Unless you spam RoH combo ). So, by using Fracture, you're decreasing your average potency per GCD.

Ahh, that's interesting. Thanks for the note!

[Ultimatecalibur]

Basically, Fracture has a 220 cumulative potency. The average potency on PLD's rotation is higher than that (Unless you spam RoH combo ). So, by using Fracture, you're decreasing your average potency per GCD.

To be a bit more specific, the Royal Authority combo has an average potency of ~233 for ~63 TP per gcd and the Goring Blade combo has an average potency of 200 with a dot that deals 50 potency every 3s for 24s (~40 potency per gcd) for 60 TP per gcd.

A 9 gcd GB -> RA -> RA rotation and clipping the last tick of the GB dot the average potency of the rotation will be ~261 for ~58.8 TP per gcd.
A 10 gcd GB -> RA -> RA -> Frac rotation that does not clip the last tick of the GB dot the average potency of the rotation will be 262 for 61 TP per gcd.

Using Fracture is basically a .3% dps increase at the cost of a 6% increase in TP consumption.

[Reynhart]

Using Fracture is basically a .3% dps increase at the cost of a 6% increase in TP consumption.

If you clip GB, then you may have too much skill speed.

I've made a calculation on a 90 GCD window and using Fracture is a DPS gain only if you clip GB on at least 9 full rotations. In real situations where you probably move a little and might lose some tenth of a second, it's mostly innefective.

[Ultimatecalibur]

If you clip GB, then you may have too much skill speed.

Clipping will happen no matter what. Even a base gcd of 2.5 will clip a 24s dot if inputs are perfect. 22.5s for 9 gcds does that, but you will get the 8 ticks (for 400 damage) if the first tick happens between 0s and 1.5s after the dot is applied.

I've made a calculation on a 90 GCD window and using Fracture is a DPS gain only if you clip GB on at least 9 full rotations. In real situations where you probably move a little and might lose some tenth of a second, it's mostly innefective.

Agreed, and to get to that point you would need around a 2.00 gcd and would burn through all of your TP in a 90s rotation.