Am I doing something wrong?

[muraseme]

This is my first post on these forums, but I have been a reader for a long time.  Recently, I joined a raiding guild, and I am having a blast, but I am concerned about my dps.  So, in order to give an idea of where I should be, instead of where I am, I am going to give a boring discourse on my gear,  and AAs, then talk about tactics.  The majority of my CAs are adept IIIs, including all bow shots, but a handful of the melee attacks (including Ranger's Blade) and the DPS buffs are master Is.  I have no adept I spells.

 

My question is this: On the past few raids, my dps seems to be somewhat low.  Typically, I am third or fourth on the parse, behind a very well geared assassin, ranger with far better gear and wizard (third if she dies, fourth if she lives, it seems, lol), but there is of course deviation.  Sometimes I am number one and sometimes I am 6th or 7th.  Number-wise, I range from a low of about 700 on some names to a high of 1800 on trash.  I'd say I average about 1100-1200.  From looking at other posts on the forums, this seems low, and is definitely not consistant by any means.

 

Gear

Only about a third of my armour is Fabled, currently - but self buffed I have 468 Str, 475 Agi, 288 Sta, 252 Int and 109 Wis.  I have the haste belt dropped from Hurricanus, giving me a total of 63 haste.  DPS is not modified.  I have the mastercrafted rings for Str and Agi (T7 of course).  I can not think of any more armour or gear that would be important information..

..except weapons.  I use the Adamantine Dragonfang and Vyemm's Fang as melee weapons, and the Wyrm Destroyer Bow for ranged.

 

AAs

Currently I have 74ish AA points.  On the predator tree: Agi line, 4/4/4/8, Int line, 5/4/4/8.  Ranger tree: Multishot line: Precise shot 5, Triple Volley 5, Selection 5, Rain of Arrows 5, Double Attack; Poison line: Caustic 3 (or maybe 4, I forget).  Clearly I have selected ranged attacks and poisons as priorities.

 

Tactics

On pull, I am typically stealthed.  I open up with Focus fire, then Veiled Fire (adept III) followed by as many ranged attacks as I can get away with.  This changes if the encounter has a few mobs in it, and if think I can get away with it, I will use Focus Fire, Selection, Rain of Arrows then spam all the non-stealthed ranged attacks I can.  I'll typically surveil the next mob the MA attacks and then hit it with Veiled Fire.  Sniper Shot is typically used on named only, and then at the beginning of the fight.  I use grandmaster caustic poisons.

 

Provided the mob is still alive, one minute later (for recast timers, of course), I will use Killing Instinct followed by the other ranged abilities.  I close to melee if practical (no AoE from the enemies, ranged recast timers slow, et cetera).

 

Ahh yes, one more fact I forgot to mention: group setup.  Unfortunately, we rarely have full four group raids, and couple of people in group four (one of which is usually me) can not enjoy some of the nicer buffs.  So, with the above information, consider it as is, with no other buffs, please.

 

Thanks for reading!

Message Edited by muraseme on 12-07-2006 11:21 PM

[hieronym]

sounds about right to me.  Without a good group setup your DPS will suffer for start and then your gear. Wym bow is uber pants imo with mobs loving to parry and deflect loads of shots so you will lose dps there for a start and unfortunately without a bow that can summon arrows and having the highest damage rating your dps will always be lower. Get them to raid HOS or DT (tari is a real joke now) for the better bows. Also buy some str/int potions that you can use depending on you group setup. You can only use one at a time but the added 66 str or int will help a lot if you are in the tail end group. My int is about the same as yours and my caustic was hittin for over a 1000 a tick so you can see thats free dps right there.Try to time focus with a brigand debuff for added dps. Get the brig to make a macro so when they use debuff it puts a message in raid channel, hit focus and then go nuts for 10 seconds :smileytongue:

[muraseme]

Thanks for the advice.  I will coordinate with the brigand's debuff and hold off on Focus Fire until he does that.

[LoreLady]

Doin that with brigs does help ALOT - also try learning how to button mash instead of click - you get all your stuff out that much quicker. Use debuffs first then your big shots (note this tactic can be worse in groups where the mob dies really quick).. 

Secondly - tanks will hate you for this, but I find it helps.. Snare/pickoff as its incomming - and completely ignore the "downtime" that most tanks require... I always say its there job to take agro as fast as possible its ours to do damage.. Tanks need to quit [expletive haxx0red by Raijinn]ing already.

Thirdly - use your big attacks every fight, rain, vieled fire, etc.. And find a pattern that works for you, use ACT frequently - and find out what gives YOU the most overal dps.. ACT is a great tool to help you wher eyour lacking -everyone can improve somehow.

[muraseme]

I've followed the "dispatch" advice and its worked very well.  In tonight's raid, my average dps was about 1100, up from between 700 and 900.

 

Thanks for the advice!

[Jeris Nefz]

Another thing that has helped is placing your big hits (like rain of arrows) at the END of Focus Aim.  It takes some practice and timing.  As long as you start it while Focus Aim is up, you can essentially "extend" your focus aim that much longer.  I am usually able to get at least one more attack in that way.  That is an easy way to get a "2 second extension" of Focus Aim.  Once I got the timing of that, that raised my dps a bit from just that.  It's not going to take you from 700 to 1700, but it might boost you 50-100 dps (depending on  your equipment).

[VisualFoundry]

I agree with the previous comment regarding focus aim, and generally save my long casting time CA's until the end of the buff. Here's my general order: Focus Aim, auto, Dev Arrow, auto, Triple Volley, auto, Amazing Shot or Confounding Arrow, auto, Surveillance + Veiled Fire macro OR Rain of Arrows (depending on group vs. single mob encounter). Using this system I regularly get 1000-1200 zonewide in KoS raid zones. The use of Dev Arrow in the beginning softens the mob up for everything that follows. My third choice depends on which of the two CA's is up at the time - usually I go with Amazing Shot since it does slightly more damage. Coordination with the brigand's Dispatch is of great value as well. Actually speak with your brigand and see if you can work out a timing system with them to allow you to plan your CA rotation around their use of the debuff.

Unlike many rangers I've seen I actually use a fair amount of melee as well. My first action upon engaging with a raid mob is to find the optimal location behind the mob and in the sweet spot that allows both ranged and melee CA's to function. I exhaust my ranged CA's first. Once I'm to the point where I'm waiting for ranged timers to reset, I will fire off as many melee CA's as I can between auto attacks. The trick I've learned with regard to this is that it is possible to switch to ranged auto-attack before the timer for a melee CA is completed. Doing it this way avoids the loss of a ranged auto attack and the bit of delay that occurs when one waits for the CA to finish and then hits the ranged auto-attack button.

And for reference, I am using Wurm Destroyer Bow with T8 (Ichorstrand) ammo

While this system works well for me, I'm open to suggestions on how I might improve this as well.

Hask Grayscale

70 Ranger of Tacticians of Vengeance, Kithicor Server

[doyler2k]

Not exactly the most uber ranger out there but i find starting fights in Stealth then casting focus+seletion=Grp enc or Focus with Veiled on single enc.with that in mind just hope your tank isnt slacking and you pull the mob right through the raid force. Big angry mob on Ranger=Even more angry Raid Leader Did this a few times before,always nice when caustic crits along with rain/selection.Not so nice when u chewing dirt soon after of course. I also changed from str/agi AA setup to Agi/Int and notice so many more crits.Aint had a chance to compare my zonewide DPS just yet but from what i can see it looks to be better. Last i checked i was doing just over 1200 zonewide,but that was with str/agi setup. PS how much does the raincaller rock...If only that was t7...

[muraseme]

Thanks for the Focused Aim tip.  And, typically, I did *not* hit it with Devitalizing Arrow first, but I will do so from now on.  Thanks !

 

As far as Rain Caller goes, it seems to be the ultimate soloing bow.  There have been numerous fights were it procs on the first hit, and keeps the mob there until its dead.   The poor chaps never close in to melee.

[BSbon]

you should max out your archery crit AAs and dont forget to melee. with the 8 in the agi line your melee attacks only take .37 seconds to cast. with the stealth attack and stealthed attack you should hit for over 2k (that's what i hit for at level 61) in .74 seconds.