[Stormblood] [Dragoon Rotation] COME ON AND SLAM

[SunnyHirose]

I think it is on topic, thanks for sharing. It is pretty spot-on from a "this is what you do if you are Robocop" perspective. Which is the complete opposite angle from what I'm trying to take, of course; the further your and your raid group's performance is from Momo's (it is a very skilled melee player and a very skilled team), the less I feel that should be the concern. So surely I've made myself a laughingstock in some Discord chat or two, but when it comes to very different recommendations, it's really not about whether the legit speedrunner or some sweaty goonlord on the OF with too many spreadsheets open (and isn't raiding this season) is more credible. It's different goals.

For instance, my sample opener is not there to take you to the top of FFLogs or prevent any awkwardness; it's there for learning the job. So you get to the unavoidable and common BfB -> FT/WC check -> Geirskogul -> Mirage check -> Nastrond sequence almost ASAP, instead of hesitating about whether such-and-such really the best place to BfB (but note the guide never says that, it is rather my hope that one tries it out and starts internalizing that sequence without my input). And where Jump gets awkward, it's at that time you're staring the actual cost in the face, rather than eating it in the opener. Hiding it can be optimal in many situations, in fact, but from the emphasis I'm trying to place, I file that under "clever gambit", not "should do".

In economic terms, the "cost" of something is what you could have done with the same resource (time, for most DPS activity). But also in economic terms, your options to exercise are limited, and further limited by your awareness of those options. So I'm trying to look at it as a problem of calling the shots as they come, and that must give you different conclusions from the problem of fitting the most actions into a time window, aligning your buffs for one last hurrah as a fight closes, etc.

If I did have a criticism: Some of the stuff in the first section doesn't sound factually correct, e.g. you can just hold that Geirskogul for Dragon Sight, no biggie, but maybe there are different opener considerations that are being taken as a given there.

If I had praise: Momo has masterful uptime, observe it closely. I also seem to recall a reddit comment that was good enough to be a guide on its own, but I can't find it now and I may just be misattributing it in my head.

[aleph_null]

Thanks for the insights. Your guide does a really good job at helping people learn the job (e.g. general rotation, openers, cd/ogcd management), Momo's guide gave some good examples at how he optimizes his play further by taking into account the encounter designs. While his play probably requires masterful play from the rest of the group as well, I believe that by seeing what he does we can learn a bit about the thought process behind it, as in why he does this and not that. I agree that this kind of optimization is sorta robotic, and probably requires you to map every single gcd in each phase. It's definitely not for everyone, and it probably only matters when you're squeezing that last % of performance out of your job. Then again, personally what I consider as the best thing about these videos:

If I had praise: Momo has masterful uptime, observe it closely.

So much this. I'm impressed at how good he is at maintaining uptime. Personally I'm not that good, so if I try doing the same thing I'd most likely end up wiping the group or burdening the healers more often than not, but it's interesting to see how some of the really good players do things. Those "wow so you can do that?" moments are probably the main reason why I enjoy watching speedkill runs from Momo's group, Angered, Rushers, etc.