So, I'd like to discuss this data...rationally, please

Well... Again Ogat maybe its just me that today I'm a bit slower lol, I've just drive 800 Km and I'm tired, also I haven't read the whole thread but... Shouldn't those DPS values consider also stats? I mean each player can have different stats, they can even use a soda so the DPS might be not real. So that DPSs values should be divided by a number showing the player stats in that very moment. Those numbers can't be accurate without taking stats into consideration.

Agreed because even though it is the top player in each category the player with the top HL AM dps could have better stats and gear than the player with the top HL WM dps and that goes for all of those charts. It makes sense Kaiser it makes sense.

If this data is based on pure boss fight potential, I can say I agree based on my experiences.

Not to mention group makup...

For example one test may include precision buffs (hl) and might/crit buffs (elec) and another may not be receiving them.

I don't think so. Nature's AM is different than others. It could never be good DPS by itself. Nature and WM are a great combination. There are a lot of bad nature DPS, despite it being one of the easiest powers to use.

Somewhat true. Yes rage cannot do its am at the exact same time as its WM... but a typical rage rotation is::

Galling Eruption clip Bloodlust, WM, retch, WM, dreadful clip retch, WM, dreadful clip wretch, WM Repeat.

While doing this you are getting your WM and the crit buffs off dreadful plus doing the combo for dreadful, therefore you are performing combos and WM at the same time. If you were to make rage's AM alone keep up with WM + burst alone then rage would be that much more powerful as a hybrid, seeing as the hybrid build is what put it so high up on the chart Spytle posted.

One reason for this though is that rage has a lot higher modifiers than the other combo powers, better ranged AoE(except cel plague c DL), and constant dots (retch+galling). All of this on top of quick, clippable combos that you can easily throw WM in between makes it much more viable than the other two combo powers.

Regardless, I believe it would be pretty tough to balance AM vs WM and still keep WM+AM near an even playing field. It would still result in WM+AM being the only competitive way to DPS(granted it shouldn't be a competition), so those that wish to only run AM, or those who only want WM, would still be left in the dust.

For that case you would just have Rage Dot cancel the WM crit or give Combos the same crit window as WM. That way you either cancel the crit window on WM while using dots or give Combos the same chance to crit after each other like they have if used to clip a WM combo.

Thats pretty much the only way I can see this chart being anywhere close to correct. The precision damage from the WM combos is where a majority of the damage comes from in any WM rotation, where the opposite SHOULD be true.

I think this whole dilemma is solved if the WM combo damage is reduced and the selling point of WM becomes the crit window. If my explosive shot isn't hitting for 5-10k on groups of adds, then I'm likely to find that AM's are more balanced. I don't think the damage is necessarily "bad" on any one of the current AM's, I just think the precision portion of the WM combos is so out of whack that anything else doesn't even begin to compete.

The balance of WM and AM's should be based on a WM combo with a burst at the end vs an AM combo using clipped weapon attacks. WM and AM's should always be completely separate to give 2 unique playstyles, but instead, the AM damage is coming from people combining the two.

Reduce the precision on the comboed weapon attack in the WM combos and make the crit window be the selling point and we are in a much better place.

Wow, Spytle thanks for he time, the data, the explanations, and the attempt to find correct information to share.

The breakdown of what counts towards AM and WM for HL is both interesting and confusing.

I really feel foolish during HL AM testing for pushing for chompers to stay multi-target burst purely for WM bonus. If that power would have gone full second DOT as was in the first iteration of HL test the disparity would be much more obvious in the numbers even with the accounting method.

Not trying to move away from HL but Rage's primary damage mechanism is dreadfull blast comboed (AM) into itself and clipped. The graph shows rages AM outpreforming WM which tells me the AM is getting the credit in those rotations and washing out the (WM). I understand it get complicated. And your time an effort here are appreciated.

There might be some confusion, based on what I am reading, as to what it means to do WM and follow up into an AM. You can't truly do AMs and WM to their full potential at the same time. They do, quite literally, cancel each other out. The only thing you can do is a WM Combo, which is white damage, but the crit will not happen if you have an AM going.

Wanted to make sure that was clear.

I could see this working, great idea. At the same time they would need to go back and look at celestial and HL and give HL some decent AoE, and celestial higher modifiers. A good option here could be to move retribution and wither to the location on the tree that consume soul and wrath of the presence are to swap the modifiers. Also, as stated, HL AM would do well to have better chainable ranged combos than they do currently as with current content ranged is always the go-to option for max DPS.

Either way, all together I do believe that it would take some time and effort to go back and balance AM and Wm in a way that wouldn't make WM+AM over powered. I am very happy though that we have finally found the flaw that has been producing all the underwhelming AMs, which was just an error in what classifies a power as using AM vs using WM. Possibly with the changes that Spytle discussed with Tunso in how the data is gathered will help balance our AMs with WM a lot more as I really miss celestial combo chaining.

We're aware of that.

The issue in the matter is the precision damage the WM combo moves do (IE: In solar flare > explosive shot, explosive shot is the combo). The damage is so high that getting the crit window becomes nothing more then a decent bonus.

I am under the impression that you guys intend for the crit window to be the "goal" of completing a WM combo right? But that crit window becomes much less important when my weapon attacks are hitting for far more damage with no power cost. Thats where I think we're mixing you guys up here. Your intent for AM's is to have clipped weapon attacks to give that "pre GU 36" feel, but you net far more damage by combining the two because of how much damage that comboed weapon attack does.

Precision damage in general is out of whack with might, but even more so in these WM combos that, in a lot of cases, are hitting for tens of thousands of damage at times.

Spytle, thank you for the clarification and the time you have taken to help us understand all of this a lot better. I've been playing for almost 3 years, and the WM AM has been a little confusing at times.

I agree. I've long thought WM itself was imbalanced, and the original intent was lost. *looks at sig*

I forgot to ask, will there eventually be an increase in might damage for AM, because it seems that weapon damage from WM for some of the power types is still a lot better than the AM. It may also be possible that I misread the chart.

Ofc they should,I'm not saying those are parses everyone will get as I understand it these are the current limits of each individual playstyle with the max stats buffs and what not, it's not an acurate representation of the community as a whole I'd see it more as an indicator of what is possible(since all those parses actually took place), there's a lot of factors to consider here- most importantly those are boss fight parses, all they show is how the powers and playstyles at maximum performence(since this is data from actual gameplay) compare with each other on high hp targets over extended periods of time. Ofc no single instance consists of just boss fights, aditionally those people were probably not dpsing together, different group setups, group buffs so on and so forth. All this chart tells me personally is that under the right circumstances all of those playstyles can perform well.

This is 100% true for any powers that aren't combo'd I agree, and I do see the difference you mean. Now with a power such as rage for example, if I were to purely use the AM (galling clip bloodlust clip dreadful clip retch Jclip dreadful clip retch...until galling is off CD) then I would not put out near the numbers as my rotation stated above. Also true if I were to skip the combo of dreadful blast and merely get the might crit, Jclip into retch Jclip then a WM combo.

With a combo'd power though, I can still achieve the might crit bonus from the end of a WM combo then follow up with the latter end of the combo. With rage this works because rage has pretty high might tics as well as quick combos to perform following, and less combos to worry about. A power such as celestial though, I would completely agree that if you were to perform WM combos followed by the AM, you would result in a reduction of overall DPS, mostly I believe due to the speed of the celestial AM and the lack of the high modifiers that rage has for similar powers.

Thank you so much for your feedback so far, and I am happy that we have discovered the missing piece of data(or more the issue with how the data was determined for AM vs WM). I do hope that this overall discussion will help in the future development of AMs as well as future balancing of AM vs WM.

The original intent was smart. It gave people a reason to perform weapon attacks by giving them a nice little "treat" at the end of a long combo with a hard hitting crit window, however in reality what we got was a front-loaded combo system where the majority of the damage actually comes from the weapon attack instead of the crit finisher at the end of the combo. Yes, the weapon attack should be hitting pretty hard if we're going to be sitting in the combo that long, but not nearly to the extent it is now where it is at times more than tripling my crit window damage.

Agreed. As stated for celestial alone, we can out damage our AM with pure "dry WM combos" and buffs. On live atm, if I was celestial against a boss, I would perform better buffing with benediction clip annoint then following with pure WM combos(never using a might crit), than I would if I were to use my AM to its fullest potential.

And this imbalance is still glaring with a full might build. Back when it was on test, I found it very difficult to get the might crit close to the WM finisher, even with a PI. Had to use the longest WM combos. Even then, the total precision damage to get there dwarfed the might crit.