I'm on Phinny and looking at my druid wondering what's up with Dots. I thought the trade off for dots taking longer to do damage was that they would be more efficient. This isn't the case. In SoD our spell line up gives 5 nukes and 2 dps dots. The damage per mana ranges between 5.3 and 8.7 damage per mana. Nukes Dmg per Mana: 8.7 Glaciating 6.1 Winter Flare 5.5 Harvesting 5.5 Summer Solstice 5.3 Morning Glory *(6.26 Average) Dot Dmg per Mana: 6.8 Horde 5.5 Sunsinge *(6.15 Average) My question is, why are dots, on average less mana efficient than nukes? Shouldn't it be the other way around?
Don't know about SoD, but for EoK/RoS spells, DoT are definitely more efficient. You may want to test on a guild hall dummy, and use actual damage numbers, instead of numbers based on the nominal mana usage and damage. We have a lot of AAs which boost damage, and mitigate mana usage. For a recent test I ran, here's what I found (per cast): Sunflash (DoT): 405K damage, 3200 mana, 126.6 ratio NFW (DoT): 650K damage, 6500 mana, 100.0 ratio Horde of Polybiads (DoT): 560K damage, 5400 mana, 103.7 ratio Summer Sunfire (DD): 57K damage, 615 mana, 92.7 ratio So, a couple useful points here.... first, DoTs are more efficient. Second, they do WAY more damage. So, if you look at damage per time taken to cast it (some call this WDPS), DoTs are far and away the best way to go. Assuming the mob will live through the whole length of the DoT. For my recent play (moloing), I'm either using the DD to get GoM procs, and using that to cast the DoTs, or (if content is a bit tougher), just casting the DoTs to get the mob dead quicker, and then just taking med breaks when needed.
Thanks for the reply. It's good to know DoTs become more efficient. I was suspicious, since the DoT changes, that the end game was where things ended up balanced. Since I have this thread going let me ask another druid question - does a well-played druid actively weave damage in with heals or in current content is healing the only thing we can do? I'm on Phinigel so my "current content" is different than live, of course. But still curious for any input on the topic. It looks like by Underfoot we start getting nukes that provide heals or nukes that buff up heals with twincasts. It does seem like druid maintains a nice balance between healing and dps that the other healers haven't. I like the idea of being a wizard. But I like the idea of being a cleric too =)
For me (a soloing/moloing druid), I use the two fast-casting DoTs and Stormstrike/Fire Storm to do damage while healing the tank merc. I also use Wrath of the Wild and the Surge DS spell to get a decent amount of DS damage, as well. The spell which nukes target's target and adds a 2-cast healing twincast is also useful when things get busy.
I like to think that we weave heals in with DoTs/Nukes I use a similar approach to Tatanka but I prefer wrath to horde. For most content I have enough time to do some decent damage.
Agreed, Wrath is a great spell, and the one most likely to finish before the mob dies. Unfortunately, I'm F2P right now, so for names and multi-pulls (I'm not in EoK/RoS atm, obviously), the A5 tank is thin enough that I can't be not casting a heal for very long
Thanks for the feedback Tat and S33k. Druid seems like one of the classes that benefits least from moloing. At least in terms of xp/hour. But it's probably a nice leisurely way to solo.
To the OP: Are you just looking at the spell stats? Cause that doesn't take into account various AAs and other abilities (focus, tribute, pots, etc) which can extend DoT duration. I think that's the main way that DoTs wind up being more efficient than DDs, but which doesn't show up on paper.
Yeah, molo is very inefficient. However, when you want to take down summoners, there really isn't a choice (except grouping, obviously). But for true solo, druids are hard to beat, XP/hour-wise. At your level, I did a lot of mass charming, and it's crazy fast XP. Quadding and quinting can also be quite good. The caveat there, of course, is that the mobs can't summon
Do raid geared druids still have mana problems or does gear mostly help that? I see a bear pet spell that looks like it gives mana back every 5 minutes but I can't tell how much that actually it gives.
Charm is a fun way to level for any class that can do it. Sounds like you might have done it via swarm charming. I do that on the bard and really enjoy it. I'll have to give it a shot here on druid too. And yeah I'm just looking at what I can see. So I can see spell stats and AA's but not much detail about how the AA's scale and the focus effects from gear and such. I know there are a lot of variables to be aware of. Though for the original question - are nukes as efficient as dots - dots and nukes both get lots of focus and AA's to make them better. So looking at the base stats makes sense to me. Sure dots get AA's that buff them but so do nukes. Hence why I came to ask =D
Yep, swarm charming, did it a lot in the TSS "Glacier" zone (forget the name) and also in the SoF zone with the gators (LOL, forgot that zone name, too!). Yeah, the reason for my follow up post about the abilities which add ticks is, THAT'S where DoTs become more efficient than DDs. The 3 tick DoTs are 6 for me, the 6 tick DoTs are 9, and the 9 tick DoTs are 13. And that's not counting the player made pots which add another tick. And occasionally, the 9 tick DoTs actually get 10, and the 13 tick DoTs get 14. As far as the AAs which affect crit rate and crit size, the DoTs have a small advantage. 57% crit rate (DD) vs. 55% crit rate (DoT), but 340% crit size (DD) vs. 375% crit size (DoT). And to top it all off, the efficiency stats I first quoted are from actual parses I did in the guild hall, same buffs for each, so that's after accounting for everything you think of, and everything you don't. DoTs are more efficient, and they drop DPS much more quickly. The only reasons not to use them are: You can't work in med breaks, and so want to conserve mana, and if the DoT won't be on the mob for the full duration.
Ah, yeah those are the things I can't see well in the AA section. I can only see the first rank of a lot of this stuff. Extending DoTs definitely makes them come out ahead. Plus the extra crit damage is great. Last druidy question for now; how well do you handle mana? If you want to weave in decent DPS but still heal can you do that or do you just run out of mana if you do? I'm curious for both group and raid. If I main druid I'll eventually be raid geared and I know that makes a pretty big difference when it comes to keeping up until med breaks.
OK, I just realized another issue you're having. Use this link: http://www.raidloot.com/AA.aspx That site can be used to sort through and look at every AA we can get (any class, it's all there). Then you may get a better idea how things will evolve. I'm a poor person to ask that. Other than a brief stint last year, I have been solo/molo, or a 3-boxer only for well over a decade. For solo/molo, I don't worry about it, I just get things dead, and med up when I need to (not inconveniencing anyone since it's just me). As you saw in my first post in this thread, you can make choices to keep mana on an even keel, but then of course you'll do less DPS. When I grouped last year, I saw that most mobs die very quickly, so it was hard to contribute a lot DPS-wise. Our DDs don't do all that much, and while the DoTs do great DPS, we go OOM quickly, and if the mob dies with many ticks left on the DoTs, then you're really wasting mana. I mainly stuck to DDs, Storm Strike, Wrath of the Wild and other DSs, and then dropped in a big DoT on GoM procs.
I think an important lesson from this is there are so many layers of stuff that happens between the base spell effect on the spell information and the end result that it's challenging to figure out how strong a given spell. (See: https://forums.daybreakgames.com/eq/index.php?threads/wizard-dps-web-app.239137/ for a group who is doing thise). It's much more clear to parse it out by attacking combat dummies or live mobs and seeing what the actual result is.
"stuck to" Summer Sunfire (Sunflame? alternated with Frostreave Crystals) DDs? or Dicho & Remote & Roar nukes which weren't in your calculation up there? Besides still running NFW agressively, and then Chill/Eruption whenever there's more than one mob? I find druids to be way solid group dps contribution.
I'm sure that worked for you. In my case, I was still pretty scrub, so, less than 100K mana, and Dicho was rank 1 (no progression), so not a good use of mana. The Roars also appeared to be a poor use of mana to me (efficiency-wise), perhaps I'll go revisit that. I did use NFW when above 60% mana, but once I dropped below that, I'd just wait for procs of GoM. Great spell, but burns through a scrub mana bar pretty quick! I did make good use of the Remote spells, and Winter's Wildflame, so there was plenty to continually nuke. Now, I'm back to moloing, so not really an issue any more. But you are correct, as you move up in power, there are more things that can be worked in. However, this thread was mainly about DoTs and mana efficiency, so I skipped a lot of details about other DDs which can be used.
Yeah the reason I started this thread is basically trying to figure out if druid is a good fit for me. I really like the idea of filling multiple roles - being able to bring dps and still heal. The idea of just sitting and healing is kinda boring to me. But if I can either fill in a dps slot when someone else is healing or filter some DPS in with heals, then I'd probably be pretty happy. Mostly I'm worried that all I'll ever get to do on raids is heal/cure and that the group game would end up being the same. I think druids are awesome, because they're like cleric wizards. But maybe we're a lot less wizard than I want them to be heh.
I hope what's taken away from this thread is the importance of asking the question you actually want the answer to. Rather than look directly at spell data, some experiential investigation may help you more. My strong feeling is that you don't give a **** about numerical efficiency, it's about how classes play -- Clerics, if there's an open spot in group, will pop a wiz or melee merc for "oh well, at least the spot isn't empty" dps. Clerics add dps generally by encouraging bigger pulls (they can heal tank/group through killing more at once), but also the dps they can add directly is healing the tank anyway (their best nukes are all in the druid "remote" style) Shaman, also dps merc, but favoring a melee one since (duh) there's a shm around. Shm dps is fired up at the beginning of battles and they can alternate heal casts or damage casts as needed while their damage-over-times (via literal DoTs or via group proc buffs) or heal-over-times (via literal HoTs or via waves of Swell) run. Having a merc fill hp bars even keeps the over-time healing shm naturally do (with the aforementioned Lion buff that's cast for dps, and the aforementioned Swell they cast for efficient powerful healing) from being efficient. High level druids will pop a priest mercenary, because having it do the job of refilling hp bars (when there isn't an emergency, obvs) frees up the druid's cast time to be actively dealing way more damage than a mercenary can ever make. The druid doesn't not participate in keeping tank/group alive, the division of labor isn't all-or-nothing, but the idea is to only use those abilities that are both good and necessary while casting the most damage that can be crammed in. Druids want to be in a spot to not even load the Luna & Vida.
Also, damage per mana isn't the only kind of efficiency. The damage per cast time is a huge deal. How much damage will the enemy take from you spending 3.5s (cast time + GCD) casting Glaciating versus spending 2s casting Horde of the Hive.
