Dragoons: A Rotation Reborn

[rickyguo]

wait how is this situation of holding bfb an overall net potency decrease

if you get the same amount of bfbs in a fight, then isn't it only affected by on which part of your rotation you're using bfb on? isn't it then better to wait to use it at the part of the rotation with the most +potency if you know for sure you won't lose a bfb?

wheres the net potency decrease coming from

lets say that you can only get 6 dfds in t13 as it lasts shorter than 12 minutes, then you got like a sub 2 minute window to delay dfd in that fight and not lose any dfds. Even if you're only hitting one target ever, it's still a dps increase to delay dfd so that its being used during bfb if you know that all the delays combined won't lose you 1 dfd in the fight

[Dervy]

wheres the net potency decrease coming from

You kind of answered your own question. By delaying BFB by 5 GDCs to ensure that your last BFB is ending towards the end of the encounter (thus skewing your DPS results slightly), you're now using BFB on points of your rotation where you're not benefiting as much from BFBs.

Just to make numbers more simple, I'm only comparing the relative Potency Increase of BFB, not the entire potency because Big Numbers are scary at this time in the morning:

No Delay: 4475.274
Delayed: 4210.002
Difference: 265.272 Potency

I overestimated the Potency difference (napkin math), but it's still a difference, a significant one.

If I were accounting for my manual GCD clips so I'm always landing my BFBs on my highest potency abilities, like I usually do with my "no delay" scenario, we'd get this result:

No Delay: 4675.563
Delayed: 4412.706
Difference: 262.857

And the delay is actually greater than my napkin math. After your first BFB application at 7s (if it's before a CT), your hardwired BFB cooldown is then applied at 91s, which really skews your overall potency, significantly. This is why you should either: use BFB optimally to benefit phases in a raid, either right on cooldown, no more than a 1GCD wait, or no more than a 1s clip to to get that 0.5 additional PPS.

As for Dragonfire Dive and Spineshatter Dive? That's a completely different story.

Now - I could be wrong for some other instance where your clear time is shorter. There may well be a time were using BFB in another one of your raids would be more beneficial (lower/longer raid time, thus different GDC waits etc), but it'll only ever work in that specific situation, so you'd have to run the numbers yourself. But as a general rule of thumb, don't delay BFB as it's already timed very well.

I think what AyaLiz is describing is less about combining CDs in general and more about combining your final usages of non-GCDs together since together they're stronger than used individually. It applies to pretty much every class including tanks and healers, but can be hard to execute perfectly on a whim without repetition of a fight enough that you know what your timeline is - well, except for long CDs like DFD or pot, very easy to tell if you're gonna clear a fight within their recasts and you can adjust easily. It's sound advice honestly since sustained PPS on a skill, taking into account its recast and duration, doesn't mean much if it's not coming back up anyway and you can treat them differently.

And I agree. But this rule doesn't apply to Blood for Blood. I always delay my DFDs in Raids by a few seconds if it can benefit my overall raid DPS. Same goes for my Spineshatter Dive. As long as you fit in the amount of oCDs you should be, per instance, then it doesn't matter when you land them.

In fact, if you want to maximise your raid DPS even more, timing it so your oCDs matches up with maybe one or two of your BFBs is better - Not the other way around.