How do I maximize my DPS? [Archive] - EQ2 Forum Archive @ EQ2Wire

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Cirro

02-20-2007, 08:33 PM

So, let me start by saying I've been playing this ranger for over a year, just after EQ2 started.I've been out sick for 6 months, and we know how much the game can change in that amount of time...And I thought I knew how to play my class, but with some of the posts I've been reading and a recent experience, I'm starting to wonder.That said, a few details about my character:Just over 6k hp and power, STR = 533, AGI = 578, STA = 382. Melee weapon: Vyemm's Fang (+12 Disease adornment), Adamantine Dragonfang (same adornment).Bow: Recurved Heartstinger (90.2 rating) with a +12 pierce adornment.Gear is mostly Fabled (Nemesis and Relic), CA are all Master I (Well, except Amazing Shot <muttergrumble&gt<img src="/smilies/8a80c6485cd926be453217d59a84a888.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />.Only have 50 AA's, AGI line is 4/4/4/8/8 INT line is 5/4/4/8 I was on my first raid after my hiatus... and barely broke 1000 DPS. I'm told there's a ranger in the guild that parses 1600-1800 regularly.I read in a posting here that "aside from a few CA's, auto-attack is better". Now, I've been doing it just like the n00b Dev they've assigned to the rangers recently. Spam the hell out of bow CAs, get close enough to do melee CAs while those refresh, rinse and repeat when the bow CA's repop.What am I doing wrong? Which CA's should I use, and which should I ignore in favor of auto-attack? <Assuming the gear listed above fits this logic.>Feel free to give me any other ideas please. Thanks in advance

LoreLady

02-21-2007, 10:47 AM

AA's are the best solution for you right now, the next step is getting the DT ammo - or in the next LU crafted. Your best option for doing more dps is to get a ranged auto attack key going, and keep mashing it for afew seconds so there are as few gaps in your auto attack as possible. But really, another 21 more aa's will boost your dps by another 150 or so (estimated number).. The multishot line gives a much needed boost to some of our key combat arts. And its easilly possible to parse 1.6k-1.8k now of days.. Yesterdays freethinkers run I held 1.9k dps zonewide.

Torrin

02-21-2007, 11:19 AM

You want to Maximize your DPS for Raids? Get more AAs and start filling the EoF Tree. Dump 5 into Caustic upgrades: Caustic Poisons be doing 10% more damage then. Also Max out your MultiShot line (I went for everything except Stream of Arrows which is a waste of a skill imo). Getting Double Arrow at the end. Focus Line is your next target after Multi Shot, or if you find your AAs going up rather slow can go for Focusing First dumping 3 points in D.Stance increase and 5 into Enhance: Focus Aim. Will make your most powerful temp buff last 5 seconds longer.. With this setup in a Raid in EoF zones I'm usually parsing 1000-1200, that's using some fabled gear, 2 pieces of PvP set gear and the Raincaller bow. In KoS zones I'm between 1200-1500 depending on the zone. Almost always in the first 3 parser spots long as I'm paying attention. I'm usually MA as well, so when I pull to the tank I open with Confounding arrow (allows the tank to grab more agro since they're the first person to Melee attack the mob letting Confounding's ability take affect) after that I evade to drop my hate down pop Mortal Reminder to stick the dot on them back up into Ranged Range as i'm firing off Culling of the Weak.. then I cycle my CAs. remaining within full CA distance so I can keep refreshing Mortal Reminder on the target. It may not seem like a big deal but the dot effect of Mortal Reminder ups DPS by quite a bit since it's just extra damage for an instant-cast CA that has a 10m range. Also use HOs constantly when Ranged CAs are down. Even if you trigger and complete them yourself Ringing Blow adds a fair bit of damage to a debuffed mob and the offensive skills buff HO can inch your dps up a bit as well. It also depends on the group you're in. If I'm in a group with a Dirge, I make sure they have a macro for Cacophony. and when they pop Cacophony I pop my 3 buffs maximizing my DPS. with 125% DPS & Haste for 15sec + doing extra damage every hit with Cacophony active my dps skyrockets. Something else is see what group you're in and see what group that other ranger is in. Groups make a lot of difference in Raids on Parses. Me and another ranger in my guild have very close to the same gear and only slight differences in AAs.. yet I parse higher by 300-400 every raid due to the group differences.

Drelin

02-21-2007, 02:19 PM

Personally my dps is all about rythm, getting the timing of your auto attack down so that you can time your CA casts in between. I'll watch the damage numbers over the mob and when the auto attack hits (easy to tell the difference between a bow shot and a CA, the numbers look different and the auto attack always has a proc or two) immediately hit my next CA. A single mob encounter usually starts with the smaller CA's like precise and snaring then confounding, just giving the tank a few seconds to lock agro, then hit focus aim and its party time lol. Even with focus up tho I dont spam through the CA's, with the huge crit chance, dps mod and haste it gives it's brilliant for auto attack more than anything else so that rythm is everything. After that I'll have to rely on the melee attacks, veiled fire, snaring and precise untill either the mob is dead or the timers for focus and my main CA's are up again depending on the length of the fight. One thing I have for getting the most out of my auto attack is the ranged attack button on my 1 hotkey so that I can use lunging joust or arrow rip or whatever and with one tap immediately be back to ranged auto, I never actually melee auto in raid. Other than that (and I'm leaving some things out but its late and I want to finish this post lol) buffs are everything - haste/str/dps mods - and the rest is just experience and fine tuning. Oh and gear and AA's and poisons and ammo and... well yeah, you get the idea.

Auriak

02-24-2007, 02:08 PM

I apologize in advance for ganking your thread, Cirroco, but while we are on the topic of maximizing DPS... I have been scouring this forum for the last couple of months trying to figure out what I can do to up my DPS, but I must be doing something wrong because so far I still have yet to see the numbers I hear some rangers talk about. Last night I averaged zonewide 1.35k in CWM and 1.55k in FTH. I consider <a href="http://eq2players.station.sony.com/characters/character_profile.vm?characterId=434340104" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">my gear</a> to be pretty decent for the most part, but there are a few slots that need serious work like belt/jewelry. I am using Bazkul/T8 arrows. As for AA, I have AGI 4-4-4-8-8 INT 5-4-4-8. Ranger Tree I have Precise(5), Selection(5), Triple(5), Rain(5), Double Arrow; Dance(3), Focus(5), Snaring(5); Caustic(2). I plan on finishing off Caustic and putting the remainder of my points into Killing/Honed/Extension. For Poisons, during raids I use Grandmaster Caustic, Exceptional Enfeebling, and Exceptional Turgur. I have most of my T7 CA Masters, with the exception of a couple melee ones. I am still lacking the majority of my T6 masters, but everything is Adept III or better. The only thing I can think of, and from what I have heard numerous times from these forums, is that I must be doing something wrong when it comes to using my Combat Arts. Everyone says it's about timing them to go off between Auto Attacks. I have tried grouping my attacks together to where there are breaks in time for my Auto, but I did not notice too big of a difference. I'm not completely sure that I am pausing properly. Also, I have tried the "fire CA, wait for auto, CA, auto, etc" method I've seen mentioned but whenever I try this my DPS plummets. The way I typically fight is this... Cover Fire, Mortal Reminder, Elude. Focus Aim, Stealth, Veiled Fire/Selection(depending on whether it is group). Confounding, Snaring, Vines, Precise, Devitalizing, Triple, Culling, Amazing Shot. At this point, I will just switch to using whatever is back up while throwing in Sniper Shot. Rain of Arrows, Honed Reflexes, Killing Instinct for good measure. Please, what am I doing wrong? I have been stuck around 1-1.5k parses, yet I hear about rangers being able to parse over 1k higher. You have to help me!

Prandtl

02-24-2007, 06:18 PM

Balerius

02-24-2007, 08:48 PM

Awei@Antonia Bayle wrote: <blockquote>I apologize in advance for ganking your thread, Cirroco, but while we are on the topic of maximizing DPS... I have been scouring this forum for the last couple of months trying to figure out what I can do to up my DPS, but I must be doing something wrong because so far I still have yet to see the numbers I hear some rangers talk about. Last night I averaged zonewide 1.35k in CWM and 1.55k in FTH. I consider <a href="http://eq2players.station.sony.com/characters/character_profile.vm?characterId=434340104" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">my gear</a> to be pretty decent for the most part, but there are a few slots that need serious work like belt/jewelry. I am using Bazkul/T8 arrows. As for AA, I have AGI 4-4-4-8-8 STR 5-4-4-8. Ranger Tree I have Precise(5), Selection(5), Triple(5), Rain(5), Double Arrow; Dance(3), Focus(5), Snaring(5); Caustic(2). I plan on finishing off Caustic and putting the remainder of my points into Killing/Honed/Extension. For Poisons, during raids I use Grandmaster Caustic, Exceptional Enfeebling, and Exceptional Turgur. I have most of my T7 CA Masters, with the exception of a couple melee ones. I am still lacking the majority of my T6 masters, but everything is Adept III or better. The only thing I can think of, and from what I have heard numerous times from these forums, is that I must be doing something wrong when it comes to using my Combat Arts. Everyone says it's about timing them to go off between Auto Attacks. I have tried grouping my attacks together to where there are breaks in time for my Auto, but I did not notice too big of a difference. I'm not completely sure that I am pausing properly. Also, I have tried the "fire CA, wait for auto, CA, auto, etc" method I've seen mentioned but whenever I try this my DPS plummets. The way I typically fight is this... Cover Fire, Mortal Reminder, Elude. Focus Aim, Stealth, Veiled Fire/Selection(depending on whether it is group). Confounding, Snaring, Vines, Precise, Devitalizing, Triple, Culling, Amazing Shot. At this point, I will just switch to using whatever is back up while throwing in Sniper Shot. Rain of Arrows, Honed Reflexes, Killing Instinct for good measure. Please, what am I doing wrong? I have been stuck around 1-1.5k parses, yet I hear about rangers being able to parse over 1k higher. You have to help me! </blockquote>The key too maximizing dps is to have a clear understanding of what your attacks can do and based on that to sequence/combine them in such a way to get the most out of them. Let me give an example. This is using data from a raid a while ago:First, let's look at the damage I did from ranged attacks. Shown are the highest to lowest average damages from each "hit" of the specified ranged attack:<img src="http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h49/Balerius/RawData.png" border="0"> Now you might look at that and say "wow, I need to use sniper shot and veiled fire whenever I can. Especially when focus is up. Well, no. That's a common mistake. Because it fails to consider the cast times of our CAs, which quite frankly suck. So let's adjust that data for cast times of the CAs, cast time of stealth, and also count the number of arrows for the non-AE multi-arrow attacks:<img src="http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h49/Balerius/Cast_Arrow.png" border="0">Note where veiled fire and sniper shot are now. Also note Selection. Their relative positions and average damages are so low that quite frankly, they should never be used (Selection might be an acceptable CA on encounters with 5 or more mobs). But what about Poise, you ask? Poise makes a tremendous deifference in damage output of the CAs, but does not markedly change the relative order of things:<img src="http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h49/Balerius/Cast_Arrows_Poise.png" border="0">Now if your target is achieving 2k dps, then you really shouldn't be spending much time using any CA for less than that amount. Go ahead and use them between autoattacks, but do not sacrifice even one autoattack for them. When you are using focus aim, the order of your attacks should basically be the order above. If you have a tick left on focus, skip sniper shot and use precise shot. Don't waste your valuable focus aim time on veiled fire, selection, or snaring shot (and probably never on sniper shot either).The bottom line is that your ranged autoattacks are your biggest hitter. Except when focus is up, your basic mode of attack is to fit your ranged CAs that are on the bottom of the above list as well as ranged CAs with fast recasts in-between the ranged autoattacks (and fit melee CAs between ranged autoattacks as well).Now as for AAs. Everyone has an opinion. But as for me, I don't see how any raiding ranger would not go the predator INT line, especially with the ranger Caustic AA. Again, not to belabor the obvious, but ranged autoattack is key. Faster recast timers from the str line, just to do the crappy damage shown above by our CAs is pretty mindless imho. But suit yourself.Trivia bit: recast timer on brigand dispatch is the same as focus aim recast timer. Hmmm....OK last piece of advice. You stated you were setting up veiled fire during focus aim with stealth. Aside from my earlier point that using veiled fire during focus is a waste, you really need to use something else to setup your ranged stealth attacks. I suggest you use Longblade due to its much faster cast time. If you used longblade for veiled fire, sniper shot, and selection, the results would be:<img src="http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h49/Balerius/Cast_Arrows_Poise_Longblade.png" border="0">Note, veiled fire is still pretty much a waste and selection is worse. Because you won't likely get either off without delaying an autoattack. But you might have times you would use them. So if you are going to, at least cut down on the total cast time.That's my 2cp. And of course, your mileage may vary. Heck, my mileage varies raid to raid depending on my group makeup. The point is, know your own damage output by each attack and combine your attacks appropriately.

Auriak

02-24-2007, 09:41 PM

Thank you for your replies! I haven't had a chance to absorb them fully yet, but I appreciate your responses. They look like they contain some very good info. I also wanted to correct my above post. As you pointed out Balerius, I said that I have the AGI and STR lines but I meant to say AGI and INT. Not sure where the came from, sorry for the mistake <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

TwistedFaith

02-27-2007, 09:50 AM

OK firstly top worrying about what other rangers are doing in different guilds. Your DPS will be somewhat dependant upon the rest of the raids output, if your killing stuff slowthen your dps is going to be generally lower than if your in a guild who cant put out 20k dps per fight. Believe me when I say, i've seen a LOT of bad rangers in hardcore raidguilds who when they leave seem amazed because suddenly their 2.5k dps per fight is now more like 1k. As for maxing your DPS, get your 100 AA's knocked out. It's as simple as that, the ranger EOF lines are great. The increase dmg to caustic, double attack, and the increased duration of focus and Brutal instinct/honed reflexes kick [Removed for Content]. Beg/steal/borrow do whatever you can to get a 100+ dmg rating bow. 1. Time focus with the dispatch from your brigand 2. I use the following method: Focus, Auto Attack, CA, Auto Attack, CA, Auto Attack etc 3. Dont use anything like sniper shot when you have focus up, it takes WAY too long to cast. 4. DONT forget about honed reflexes and brutal instinct, if they are up, use em. 5. Use your melee skills, ooh I know everyone says not to but I do anyway, mainly at the beginning of the fight when i'm waiting on dispatch. 6. Be quick, got to be quick with everything if you want to hit decent numbers, know where you are, what direction the mob is facing etc 7. Walk the line between aggro and max dps, risky but if you can judge the your aggro especially on group encounters you can put out some killer numbers with our AOE's. 8. GM Posions, Crit Potion, Str/Int Potion, Deaggro Potion, Food/Drink 9. You want buffs, you want DPS buffs more than anything, next to that get some procs, ember seed from a conj is nice, and some int also. 10. Consistency, people in raids tend to slack, dont, you want to be top of the parse, go all out, each and every fight. Then rip into the slacking assasin who went AF for 3 fights.

Kala Asuras

02-27-2007, 02:36 PM

Balerius wrote:<blockquote>If you have a tick left on focus, skip sniper shot and use precise shot. Don't waste your valuable focus aim time on veiled fire, selection, or snaring shot (and probably never on sniper shot either).</blockquote>Great post Balerius, lots there to back up what i have experienced as well. I did however want to clarify one thing that I had noticed. I will often use veild fire during focus aim but slightyly differently than the origional poster. I have noticed that all the bonuses associated with Focus Aim are taken into account as long as the CA has begun casting while the buff is up. I will use the last smidge of Focus Aim to get off a longblade (almost instantanious) and start Veiled Fire. It esentialy streches out the buff the duration of the casting.

Auriak

02-27-2007, 03:01 PM

Awesome information so far, everyone. Thank you! A lot of this I have already been practicing myself but it's good to see it backed up by other rangers. I have begun working on timing my CA's between auto-attacks and was surprised that when done correctly my DPS didn't drop much if any at all. I suppose once I get good at it, my DPS can only go up <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> The hard part is watching that combat spam for auto-attack messages. Yeesh, it's giving me a headache! It is a shame the color for auto-attack can't be changed to stand out from combat arts, like critical hits can.

Nagous

02-27-2007, 06:19 PM

Just set a chat tab for only your damage, it makes it so much easier. When using a longbow generally you'll see your autoattack go off. I make pvp fraps movies to share with my guild and the thing that every one of them has said to me repeatedly is about how "you can queue attacks, you know" or why don't you macro your big hits. The basic reason for that is you miss out on autoattack by stacking your ca's and generally speaking, your autoattack is going to do alot more damage then any of you ca's. CA's for us are dps augmentations, the greatest portion of your damage is from pierce, moreso then any other class. Most other dps classes need to use a CA to put up big numbers, i can go through a raid zone autoattacking and just using focus/killing instinct/honed reflexes as they pop and still be top 5 dps on the raids.

Gareorn

02-27-2007, 06:28 PM

Kala Asuras wrote: <blockquote>Balerius wrote: <blockquote>If you have a tick left on focus, skip sniper shot and use precise shot. Don't waste your valuable focus aim time on veiled fire, selection, or snaring shot (and probably never on sniper shot either).</blockquote>Great post Balerius, lots there to back up what i have experienced as well. I did however want to clarify one thing that I had noticed. I will often use veild fire during focus aim but slightyly differently than the origional poster. I have noticed that all the bonuses associated with Focus Aim are taken into account as long as the CA has begun casting while the buff is up. I will use the last smidge of Focus Aim to get off a longblade (almost instantanious) and start Veiled Fire. It esentialy streches out the buff the duration of the casting. </blockquote>QFE. I've come to realize that sniper is one of, if not the worst, damage skills we have when it comes to DPS due to it's long cast time. The only time I use it, is at the end of my focus cycle, just as it's about to run out. Because, without the crit, it actually can cost you DPS.If Sniper is up, hit focus and then do your normal focus routine, but instead of firing off the last CA in your routine, replace it with sniper. Like Kala said, you only need to fire it before your focus drops so don't waste your focus by firing too early.You can't go wrong by following Belarius' advice. The fact that he doesn't use sniper with focus makes me wonder about my own advice. <img src="/smilies/0320a00cb4bb5629ab9fc2bc1fcc4e9e.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

LoreLady

02-27-2007, 10:03 PM

Great post bal.. Only one thing I have to disagree with though, and something you may find will boost your own dps.. Selection outweighs emberstrike even on single targets.. Normally selection has 1.9k max - on raids it hits around 2.5k-3k.. While focus is running I find it alot better to chance a longblade and use selection when veield is not up.. Using longblade and vieldfire also helps aton.. I find that with 5s into focus I can use everything including rain (snaring excluded) and get off a vieldfire within the time frame.. I also notice it likes to crit for 5-6kish making it worthwhile.. But you are right about snipers shot - it blows.

Drelin

02-28-2007, 04:24 AM

One thing about selection, after you have poise aa and 5 points in the selection button of the multi shot aa line the cast time of the CA comes down from 3 seconds to 1.5 (even less with other class buffs eg. bard), basically that makes the CA proc like a madman. On multiple targets it really shines obviously but even on single targets its well worth using simply for the way it will set off procs.

Gareorn

02-28-2007, 12:36 PM

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but our Combat Arts cast times never go below 50%. That's why selection shows a 1.5 sec cast time with poise and 3, 4, or 5 points in the multi shot line AA. I don't think other class buffs will reduce this any further either.

LoreLady

02-28-2007, 12:56 PM

Your right - but other classes that can reduce cast timers help with everything.. while we cannot reduce our cast times anymore on tripple/selection/rain.. We can take advantage of that on everything else.

Emperors

03-04-2007, 02:31 PM

Great advice in this thread. I already do most of what is suggested and parse between 1.5k and 1.8k regularly. One question I have though, you suggest using Longblade for stealth attacks, if this is the case, what do you use Surveilance for? Also, currently I use Focus Aim by itself and run through my ca's/autoattack while it's up and then use Killing Instincts and Honed Reflexes together, is this DPS effecient? Also, I'm a little tight for hotbar space, would anyone suggest removing Emberstrike from my hotbars, since it's damage is so low and I very rarely use it.

Prandtl

03-04-2007, 04:13 PM

I'll use surveillance to drop my aggro a bit. Every little bit helps

Nagous

03-04-2007, 07:43 PM

I use surveillance by situation only, really. If i see that i'm going a bit too high on the parse with the potential to pull aggro, i'll hit it, and if blue backgrounds are OK for that fight it's usually where i'd throw in a selection. It depends alot, i have a cycle i generally go through for my combat arts, but some situations will require you to switch things up a little bit here and there. If you find that sweet spot, it's nice to be able to throw in a mortal reminder and intoxication with it, but when it's a bit hectic and you are jousting the mob it's not always practical to rely on one particular method. When equally buffed with the other 2 rangers in my guild i generally top thier zonewide dps by around 100-200 (one doesn't have t8 ammo, but all bows are pretty equal). I find staying at range for most fights and only moving in when you are firing a culling the weak or selection off and following that with longblade/ranger's blade and backing out with mortal reminder then lunging joust and a quick click on ranged auto attack after you cue your last melee CA will give you an instant ranged autoattack hit. All in all, get used to what your normal delay is between auto attacks and stagger your CA's in a way to allow the most from it. The one thing i find very useful is that Focus aim...while giving the crit chance on CA's is oftentimes better used as your CA's are refreshing as your autoattack will hit more due to the +ranged and if you have a 90+ rating longbow most of those hits will be more damage then possibly critting on a veiled fire or sniper shot. If you went for the +22 crit chance on ranged and either farm for any + ranged crit gear or augments you can get you will more often then not crit on your CA's without Focus aim on. The legendary set from EoF gives a +2 crit chance with 3 items and most of the items are preferable to me over some relic pieces. Cowl of the pathfinder, unless you have something better like Crown of Cynosure from FTH procs often enough for it to be viable dps gear. If you are new to level 70 and haven't invested in all your adept 3's and masters yet, or can afford to get them all again, do the exile quest so you can do Rallos Zek cloak quest, you can still wear it when you go back to Qeynos. A huge amount of my dps comes more from item procs and crits. Unfortunately, it's also my addiction to grandmaster poisons that help as well, but i work hard with my harvesting to get the rares to keep me supplied, which is much easier now with the lower arrow usage.

EQ2Magroo

03-04-2007, 08:06 PM

My DPS generally tends to hover around the 1k mark zone wide on raids which doesn't sound that great compared to what a lot of people are posting. However, I dont really have any "good"items apart from Raincaller, everything else is Mastercrafted really. When compared to other Rangers on raids, I am always the highest though, sometimes 2x the lowest Ranger. This could mean though that they aren't really trying. From what I've seen, the key is getting a good STR stat, high DPS mob, and good posions and arrows. I have STR of over 500 self buffed, which usually goes over 600 on raids which is where you want to be really. Using mastercrafted poisons and field point arrows, and also try to get a DPS mod buff (even if it's from an imbued ring) and you'll be half way there. Once you get all the above sorted, then you can work on your timings of AA/CA etc.

Runewind

03-21-2007, 01:58 PM

I'm risking sounding like a total noob here. Mostly because I haven't read these forums in a while. But, I'm going to ask a question that's been bugging me. I remember a post ages ago that I always thought was true because everyone seemed to think it was. That our auto attacks were queued and would go off in between our CAs no matter what we were doing (queueing them or whatever). I am guessing that this is either no longer the case or wasn't the case then and now people have realized it. So my question is how does that work? Does our AA queue itself and then go off as soon as we stop firing CAs? Like say we had no haste (I know it would never happen, but let's just pretend) <img src="/smilies/8a80c6485cd926be453217d59a84a888.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> Would that mean that if you were to fire an AA with a longbow (7 second delay) and then let's say queue 4 1.5 second cast time CAs. (I'm not near my ranger now so I can't give specifics) which would be 6 seconds of constant CA usage and then wait 1 second we would fire an auto attack again? Since it would be 7 seconds after the last AA fired? Or do we have to wait the full AA delay in between CAs for it to fire? Also I'm a bit confused as to why our Auto attack is doing so much damage now. Is it just arrows? I mean it doesn't seem possible that it could be doing that high of DPS we don't have bows that fire for thousands of damage or anything. So just an honest question on how this is happening. I realize that there is probably a thread dedicated to this. Sorry if I'm hijacking this one off topic a bit. It's a great thread though. I enjoyed reading it immensely and everyone here is very knowledgeable so if you could just humor me for a moment, I'd really appreciate it. Thanks all. Wow I didn't realize how long ago this post was posted. I got so into the discussion I forgot how far back in the forum it was. Anyway my question still stands if someone would like to answer.

Sham07

03-21-2007, 03:05 PM

I dont think anyone would consider u noob for that question since nobody realy seems to know..... some rangers say CAs do delay autoattack, some say it doesnt and just spam queue it. Im convinced it does. CAs will NEVER prevent AAs from hitting since they still hit in refrsh time but if timed wrong it may delay em. Example: U fire CAs with 1sek cast time + 0,5 sek refresh and ur bow has a delay of, lets say 3.5sek with ur current buffs. If u hit your AA and queue 2 autoattacks it will take 3sek until u can fire a 3rd CA BUT if you do so AA will be queued until after that 3rd CA which gives u an effective delay of 4sek on your bow for that single shot. After that 3rd CA your AA will hit whatever u spamqueue after but u still lost half a second..... thats not much for one shot but sums up over the course of a fight. Thats ust my 2 tin arrows thou. As i said: peeps got differend opinions on that. For me it works realy well that way.

Jayad

03-21-2007, 06:19 PM

Auto-attack will always go off if you can fire when a CA completes. But, it can't go off during the CA casting time. For example, if, at the start of a 3 second CA, your bow could fire 1 second in the future, it will have to wait an additional 2 seconds before it goes off (when your CA completes). This is why rangers time their CAs to avoid delaying their autoattack. If you queue CAs then the only times you can fire is after they are done casting, which can delay you. The idea that chaining your CAs will prevent auto-attack is not true. Because ranger dps derives significantly from auto-attack, being inefficient about having your bow delayed can cause a DPS drop.

Runewind

03-21-2007, 08:51 PM

I see now. Thanks much. So, why is so much of our DPS coming from our auto-attack now? I'm trying to figure that out. I'm looking at my Rain Caller (Not the best bow in the world, I know, but it's decent) and the max damage on it is 394 how is that such a big chunk of our damage output? Is it just the procs off the auto attack? or is it the ammo revamp, or do we just crit our auto attack for that much or what? Haha... okay... Uh, I'm an idiot. Don't mind me. I just did /weapon with all my buffs on and realized that I'm doing 833-2498 every 3.2 seconds and said ...."....oh"

Prandtl

03-22-2007, 02:03 PM

<cite>Runewind wrote:</cite><blockquote>I see now. Thanks much. So, why is so much of our DPS coming from our auto-attack now? I'm trying to figure that out. I'm looking at my Rain Caller (Not the best bow in the world, I know, but it's decent) and the max damage on it is 394 how is that such a big chunk of our damage output? Is it just the procs off the auto attack? or is it the ammo revamp, or do we just crit our auto attack for that much or what? Haha... okay... Uh, I'm an idiot. Don't mind me. I just did /weapon with all my buffs on and realized that I'm doing 833-2498 every 3.2 seconds and said ...."....oh" </blockquote> yup. And if you increase your STR, or get your STR buffed in group it will go even higher. My raincaller would crit for over 5000 on raids. Try carrying strength potions with you, and get in a group with a coercer or dirge. Their DPS buff helps alot as well.

stryker268

03-23-2007, 03:06 PM

Wow!! That's all i can say. Last night I took alot of the advice that i have been hearing and, well.....WOW! Normally on T7 raids i have been parsing right around1000 dps. I was spamming my CAs, using mental breach and I was speced Str/Sta to maximize my cast timers. I was always looking for that huge hit on Sniper, hoping that i could boost my dps with a big 20,000 plus hit. (My personal highest is 22,336). Then i started reading the things people were saying here so i decided to try them, in particular the part about auto-attack making all the difference. First couple raids i met with limited succes I had some really good parses and then sometimes I would plummet right off the list. I figured it was a timling issue so I did the old /slash weappon to make sure i had my delay right and adjusted accordingly. Last night we did both Lyceum and Labs. The very first pull in Lyceum my dps shot through the roof to around 2800!! I thought, well that is a multi-mob encounter. I was just lucky and got off both Selection and Rain of Arrows while i had Focus going. That's all. Next parse... 1900 dps. Continued to fall for al little then leveled out except on multi-mob encounters I ended up doing almost 1600 dps for the zone and was highest parser on Vilucidea. Nice! The only people who topped me were my raid leader on his Warlock (awsome toon with grest gear and knows what he is doing and and a couple of the scouts, both assassins. Next was labs. We wanted to get done quickly so the MT was chain pulling and trying to do as much dmg as he could ( a Zerker) so many times i was either waiting on my CAs to cool down orI didn't have the back of the mob. Still, i parse about 400 to 500 higher than I was in Labs before. Ended up with a zone wide parse of 1500+!! that at least 400 more than any other time I have been in Labs. Keep in mind that the only changes that i made were to use my Recurved Hearslinger instead of Wurmslayer, use hemotixin instead of mental breach, and timed my CAs to fit between my auto-attacks. I still need to respec to take the int line to maximize my poisons and put a few points into caustic. I'm hoping that this will take me substantially higher in my dps. Not to mention that i can still improve on my timing and need to stop trying to still get the big hit in with Sniper, (still can't resist the urge for that monster hit, lol). Thanks for all the advice. And if Rothgar still thinks auto-attack is not hugely important to the ranger, he needs to try this out and see. Huror- lvl 70 Ranger Vox server

Gareorn

03-23-2007, 03:37 PM

Woot! Great to hear. I spammed my CAs for so long, I still have to fight the urge to use one just because it's available. I've developed a nervous habit where I tap my fingers on the desk next to my keyboard until the time comes to press a button. We should start a self-help group for all us old CA spammers. We could call it Spam-Anon. I'll start, "My name is Gareorn and I am a CA spammer. It's been four months since I last spammed my CAs."

tooner2

03-26-2007, 12:22 PM

I read a lot of post here on these forums but never reply (post count speaks for that). This is one of the topics that, of course, peaks my interest. The thing is I am a little slow when it comes to figuring things out and understanding all those numbers and equations you guys throw around about doing damage, heck anything above the 8 color box of crayons and I am on the downward slide into confusion =)Okay, I understand the 'what' aspect of timing CA's between autoattack but I cant figure out the 'how' = Lemmie see if I am even on track here. If, for example, my bow has a delay of 4 seconds does this mean if I cast a CA with a 3 second cast time, I should wait the last 1 second for autoattack to go off rather than hitting another CA because it will hinder the normal cycle of the autoattack? If so I dont see a time where I would be able to cast more than one CA without having to wait for autoattack to go off since (going off memory here) there is no combination of CA's that would equal less than 4 seconds to keep from interfering with the autoattack delay factor (seems like a lot of waiting). If this is the case how the heck can I be sure when my autoattack has gone off? I have a seperate chat window open and, as far as I can tell through the selection boxes I have checked/unchecked, it only displays my autoattack damage. The problem for me is I cant keep track of when the last autoattack message popped to know when to hit a CA. Also I thought I read where someone was going off the numbers going off over the mobs head, how the heck can you tell what numbers are yours in all that spam? Also, if I cast a bow CA then push my hotbar range autoattack button to try and get my bow to instantly autoattack it tells me I have stopped attacking rather than doing an autoattack faster. If I have just finished a melee CA I do press the bow autoattack button to transfer back to ranged damage and it seems to work since I dont get a 'you stop attacking mesage'. Is this how it is supposed to work?Anyone willing to break it down to its simplest form for us mouth-breathing-paste eaters it would be greatly appreciated.

Jayad

03-26-2007, 03:01 PM

Grats on parsing higher, that's always a good feeling. I should mention our guild's top ranger casts CAs very fast. But I also think he doesn't lose too many auto-attack attempts because he knows when to cast and when to let one off. All things being equal, of course you want more CAs to go off, as fast as possible - as long as you're not missing auto-attacks. I'm not a ranger anymore but I know he does what he does. <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> (I do the same thing on the assassin side, whereas I know some assassins are more careful with auto-attack) Our top ranger does 45% of his DPS from just bow damage. You really need some of the top end bows (like Sarnak) and the rare summoned ammo (from DT bows). They make a huge difference. I would dump your hemotoxin, unless you're in a zone where there's a lot of AE encounters. Use caustic and get the AA ability. With AE encounters you get the chance to proc them on many mobs and get the poison DOT hit a lot. For a lot of single mobs caustic will do a lot better. Use GM of course. Using the big numbers over head method is a mistake. The visual representation of damage is always slightly behind and can be a lot behind. The best way to do it is to make a window or tab which just records your auto-attack damage. Those update as soon as the log messages come across from the server. You could make a very small window and watch that for when it's going off. With a certain amount of haste, there's a cycle with how long it takes. Always be casting during the cycle, never when you're about to auto-attack IF it's a long CA. You want to avoid delaying it by a second or two (or longer). So you wouldnt' cast sniper shot except when you've just done an auto-attack, since it has a very long cast time.

Malchore

03-26-2007, 03:51 PM

I think some rangers have a large percentage of their damage from autoattack because they are prioritizing autoattack efficiency over CA efficiency.If you want to make sure you hit every autoattack cycle without any delay in order to maximize autoattack damage, then the same logic holds true for your CAs. Your CAs also have a delay (recast time,) and if you hold off casting CAs then your making inefficient use of the CA delays. (Granted, the recast times of CAs are much longer than the delay of your bow. Thus, if you waited 3 seconds to cast an Art that has 45 second recast time, the percentage of wasted time is small.)It's a tradeoff that every Ranger makes for thier self. The trick is to have no delay in either autoattack or CAs. Can be hard to do at times.

Jayad

03-26-2007, 07:43 PM

well, the better your weapon & ammo is, the more important they are as compared to CA damage. Also remember as part of auto-attacks you get procs going off. I know our ranger who parses 2k zone wide, probably more than 60% of his total dmg is from auto-attacks and procs. So it's important to maximize that. I'm pretty sure you'd have a tough time parsing that high maximizing CAs - there's just not enough potential in them. Plus, if you're smart, you don't really miss a lot of CA opportunity.

Prandtl

03-27-2007, 01:55 PM

I'll have to agree with Jayad on this. As the quality of my bow has increased, the percentage of my total damage donr by autoattack has increased: About 20-25% for grizz, 30-35% for rain caller, and now 45% for Bazkul. My total damage done by CA's has stayed pretty much the same, while total damage from autoattack has stepped up, therefore AA's percentage has increased as well. Pretty much the only way to increase CA damage is to get a higher version of the same CA, and once you are mastered out... Not alot of improvement left

Lolianna

03-27-2007, 06:06 PM

AA's are very important; especially the EoF ones. Once you get your double arrow attack, you will notice a 200 or more dps difference. Then, begin on those aa's in your extension line. As you add them to focus aim, honed reflexes, etc, you will gradually see a difference. And again, when you get Extension, you will jump another 200-300dps. IF I am given decent buffs, I have np at all breaking 2k zone wide parses with the 'other' ranger Jayad keeps mentioning in "his guild". (Not sure why Jayad doesn't let Ricky come here and speak for himself). Bows, ammo (especially since they recently enhanced arrows), and AA's generally will be the difference between 1.2k parses and 2k plus parses.

Jayad

03-28-2007, 05:06 AM

Well, I don't like to pass out names, in the interest of privacy. But yes, he's very knowledgeable and I'm sure I can learn more about Rangers from him. <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> Buffs will also boost your dps a lot, since they will stack together in effectiveness with your other improvements. When you get legendary ammo and a great bow, the dps buff, double attack, etc. will have a greater total effect on you due to the higher base amount of dps you have. The combined effects of high strength, good ammo/bow, crits, raid debuffs, and buffs is a lot larger than any one by itself.

ricky25

03-28-2007, 08:32 PM

Yee AA lines Pred agl/int (max ranged crit22% and spell crit 52% and 35% cast time reduction) and Ranger line multishot max all except Stream (double attack 10% ftw)/focusing Max temp buffs and extension and max caustic damage 10%. Get str/int as high as you can. Use nothing but grandmasters caustic poison. BUT here is the rub <img src="/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> absolutely NEED to get the legendary ammo from bazkul or ichorstrand and absolutely NEED a high end bow....... the longer the delay usually the higher end crit chance and higher proc %. i use ancestral sarnak war bow which at this point is like the 5th best in game and not a common drop from venekor. The other bows are even harder to get #1.Rigidscale #2.Star Darkened #3.Longbow of Corruption #4.Longbow of the Grove..../sigh.... with these bows and legendary ammo auto-attack has big numbers and throw double attack on that and your laughing. In regards to grp setup usually we just don't get to pick who we have but i like coercer/dirge/inquis or Illusionist/troub/fury very nicey either grp and conj ember seed seems to be the proc for us. personally i'd pick the second of the 2 setups for the Illusionists haste/IA(25% x2 attack) and the furys int buff will drive our poison crits sky high and i can buff my own dps mod with gear i have to 33. In a perfect world a ranger has the full fabled class set for the extra 10% double attack taht would be awesome and the legs add 8% trigger chance to our Offencive proc. in regards to how you play your ranger... well, different folks different strokes. myself and meerah do not play same style yet we are very compairable in #'s at the end of the day. test it and do what works for you. but without high end bow and ammo you not gonna see high numbers period. I know kinda sucks having to get the best of the best to put up big numbers but thats the way it is. and i'll take this chance to say i'll offer 1 eye 6 fingers and a leg(above the knee) for rigidscale bow pst.

Vaiko

03-29-2007, 07:49 AM

<cite>ricky25 wrote:</cite><blockquote>... Get str/int as high as you can. ... </blockquote>When I changed yesterday gear the tool tip damage numbers for poison did not change at all. Did I missed a change to the game or did I saw something strange yesterday?

Gareorn

03-29-2007, 11:35 AM

I notice this a while back. I think it's a bug to the tool tip. If I remember correctly, right click the poison and examine it to see the real numbers. Or it may not change until you zone. I just can't seem to remember, but I'm pretty sure it's a display bug.

ricky25

03-30-2007, 05:04 AM

yea what Gareorn said and a big YEEEEE!!!! to SOE for adding the 10 dps mod bow adornment. Cheers

Hexus

03-30-2007, 05:12 AM

I know it's been said, but it's important so it bears repeating. Get your Str and Int as high as you possibly can. I personally carry int potions into every raid. Do you really need them the whole duration? No, you only need them during the initial application of the Caustic Poison. If you're in a group with an illusionist and he has the AA that gives +int and +casting skill for 30 seconds, have him throw that up while you put on your new application of Caustic Poison. Also the Shadowknight skill Death March is nice, any time they use it and I'm below 20 charges I go ahead and throw another application of Caustic Poison up for the int bonus. You'll notice that as your intelligence gets higher your poison damage will as well. While 80-180 points of damage on your poison may not seem like much, it makes a HUGE difference. Especially if you took the INT line of your Predator AA's and have the 52% chance to crit on your spells, now you're looking at 1800 point poison hits on crits instead of 1200. 600 extra damage per proc anyone? *raises hand*Something else I haven't seen mentioned, but I probably missed because I was reading really fast and just trying to get a general gist and feel for things. You have an auto-ranged attack button in your knowledge book. USE IT! Do not start your attack sequence off with an RA, you're losing time on auto-ranged. This first hit will most likely be 2-5.5k depending on crits, so you're losing that much dps out of the gate if you are using an RA to start rather than turning on Auto-Ranged. Just some pointers from an old old ranger. (EQ 1 Beta to now) Hexus LupisValor - Kithicor

athitchcock

03-30-2007, 09:26 AM

The bow and neck dps adornments stack, right? Is the 10% dps worth more than a +12 dmg adornment? (I'm thinking yes) Probably time to save up for a new bow adornment. Gnaril

LoreLady

03-30-2007, 10:25 AM

All adornments stack - yes.

Prandtl

03-30-2007, 01:41 PM

<cite>ricky25 wrote:</cite><blockquote>yea what Gareorn said and a big YEEEEE!!!! to SOE for adding the 10 dps mod bow adornment. Cheers</blockquote> Thats good news! Does anyone know the name of the adornment so I know what to tell my guild crafters?Also... I already have an adornment on my bow. Am I locked out from applying a new one, or does it merely destroy the old adrorn?

Jayad

03-30-2007, 03:59 PM

It's a Scintillating Judicious Composite Gear, made by tinkerers. I have one now <img src="/smilies/283a16da79f3aa23fe1025c96295f04f.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> Although I paid a lot for it <img src="/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

Prandtl

03-30-2007, 04:26 PM

<cite>Jayad wrote:</cite><blockquote>It's a Scintillating Judicious Composite Gear, made by tinkerers. I have one now <img src="/smilies/283a16da79f3aa23fe1025c96295f04f.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> Although I paid a lot for it <img src="/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></blockquote> Awsome! Thanks for the info.