I agree that the new AA are lack luster at best. What I've come to realize over the last little while is that for the most part it doesn't matter what the beastlord community wants or needs, we get whatever the the person in charge of AA's decides is best for us. The real turning point for me was last year at SoE live the question was asked "Could you make Ferocity MGB'able?" The response was a plain no. No explanation, no reasoning, no debate...Just no. Not that I particularly think that Ferocity should be MGB'ABLE, however some people do. I honestly felt that it was slap in the face to those of us that do make suggestions and understand the mechanics of the game and want to help improve the game play. If I seem jaded as well, it's not that really. I'm just tired of watching beasts fall behind all the time because we can't get a simple utility like mana preservation, or an increase to melee damage. But hey! We got them new ranks of protection of the warder that our cleric mercs will overwrite! My post above was merely to show hard numbers as to why I feel the way I do about dots. I know I say it time and time again, however i always neglect to really show why except in a smart a$$ remark.
Personally I like to think of dots as spending time now to get dmg later. Here is a parse of Edoth's Chill Rk. II /fs Combat Dummy Caza in 49s, 24k @495sdps --- Dommage 24k @495sdps So this dot does ~24,000 dmg every 50 seconds. This does less damage for the amount of time spent than any of our other nukes from 95-100, you might think "Oh, but it does more damage than lance and bite!" But you can recast lance and or bite before your dot has finished thus giving them more overall dmg/dps. Now the next question is, because our nukes overall have a long recast timer can I fit this in between nukes when all their recast timers are down? The answer is yes, however, you also have Feralgia. Feralgia does 90k dmg (150kdmg w/ a bard aura) over ~40 seconds which is more damage in less time. And our nuke recast timers are only ever all down at the same time after more than 30 seconds of nuking which conveniently gives time for Feralgia to refresh. But even then you have to remember you're spending time now for damage later, A) there has to be a later, and B) this equation needs to be true (dmg bought/cast time) > current dps. And yes, our dots have a cast time of 0, but they do have a global cooldown like every other spell, and since we've already established that our nukes do more dps the only argument comes down to fitting it into the cooldown which is better filled with Feralgia assuming your dps isn't too high at that moment. Here is a parse of 17 static zone mobs from BG, cycling discs w/o dps support. /fs Combined: A young fearwing in 953s, 32420k @34019sdps --- Dommage + pets 32420k @34019sdps Dommage -vs- Combined: A young fearwing: -- DMG: 23457382 -- DPS: 24614 -- Scaled: 24614 -- Punch: 11839662 -- DirDmg: 8870150 -- Hit: 1958874 -- DoT: 625600 -- Kick: 163096 -- Non-crit rate: 79.4% -- crit rate: 20.6% -- Attempts: 7761 -- Hits: 6961 -- Missed: 800 -- Accuracy: 89.7% -- Avg Hit: 3369 -- Max hit: 62943 -- DMG to PC: 4740139 DD dps ~ 9307 Feralgia pets: Dommage`s pet -vs- Combined: A young fearwing: -- DMG: 2534152 -- DPS: 2665 -- Scaled: 2659 -- Slash: 2170402 -- Hit: 265017 -- Bash: 50869 -- Maul: 29156 -- Kick: 18708 -- Non-crit rate: 78.2% -- crit rate: 21.8% -- Attempts: 3001 -- Hits: 1896 -- Missed: 720 -- Defended: 385 -- Accuracy: 72.5% -- Avg Hit: 1336 -- Max hit: 2993 -- DMG to PC: 0 I agree sadly that dots don't have a place in our dps lineup, they would have to be improved severely.
Dot's are about as useless and make about as much sense as continually getting upgrades of natural cooperation. People get annoyed at these questions (in reference to Waldagar) because they are asked every few months and the development is stagnated, therefore the situation never changes and we regurgitate the same answers to the same questions 10 or 15 times a year. I was hoping with the new forum format they would sticky very well organized and informative posts as general information of sorts because the player-run class information boards are all but dead. The reality is dot's haven't been used for a long time, and likely will never be used outside of Asp, which is nice because it's off GCD, Instant & reduces agro. We would need just as many, if not more DoT's aa's than shaman's currently have to bring them on the level of viability in terms of GCD usage, mana usage & spell gems. Stick with trying to figure out stuff like having a suspended pet with a full burn on him for double dipping and stuff of the like. Mages have done it for 10 years (also you'll beat everyone on sustained, lol monk tears!)
