I've come across this and the problems that come with it more then usual in the past few weeks. Groups being just completely disbanded or raid leaders having some sort of reality loss - expecting everybody to have huge DPS numbers.
Here's a little summary for you:
- What is DPS and is your DPS accurate?
- Why are you loosing DPS?
- How can you maintain your DPS?
- Brief summarize for those that don't want to read the book
Displaying your DPS and the accuracy of it
First: What is DPS and how do you know yours? The answer is not as simple as you think. "Installing an Addon" does not give a true representation of your actual dps. But: Neither do raids. So the numbers you see in raids are heavily influenced by the amount of monsters you fight. For example the
combat metrics addon which gives you this neat and handy little DPS bar. It calculates all DPS and
sums them up. It's not rare for me to see
150k DPS being shown in that window. However it's not my actual dps, as it's the
total dps to all mobs. So if i throw an endless hail in to a group i will instantly have more DPS then throwing it at a dummy at home. Still feeling strong? There is more to it. When you hit the dummy first off all - not all effects, scenarios and situations are met by the trial dummy. This can impact your DPS anywhere from -20k to +8k (it never seems to go over 8 tho). So getting 61k on the dummy (yeah i'm at 61k - hate me) and doing 61k in a trial - it's just not realistic (i usually loose around 10k DPS in trials). This means no - your DPS values are not accurate.
You are loosing DPS!
Be honest with yourself. Who's been doing good DPS on the trial dummy and in raid suddenly only has half of this? The main thing i notice is, that people don't
re-cast their aoe's when the boss moves. They are so stuck with doing a rotation and trying to do the best rotation possible, that they don't even realize they are missing something. Example: Hel Ra Citadel. Who knows it? The two second bosses jump around a lot and as somebody who has been on both sides i can tell you so much: The vast majority of people do not re-cast their aoe's or even
barbed trap. Yes - re-casting does cost you a lot more resources then necessary but we'll talk about resources a bit later. Another
big factor is buffs and debuffs. The big raid dummy comes with most debuffs that you have, also with
wormcult,
hircines, 100%
warhorn, etc. When was the last time you've seen hircines (the green bubbles for stamina regen) in a raid? For me i can't even remember. You be posting your trial dummy DPS to your raid lead and he goes: Oh great! You're OP! And everybody kind of goes their own way, not thinking about all the buffs and debuffs. Granted - some buffs are quite easy to achieve and almost come from alone like "Major Fracture", which a lot of classes have in their rotation these days. But what's with
Minor Fracture? Do you see your raid lead asking if anybody is using Minor fracture skills / sets? Well that's another loss in DPS right there.
In
my opinion most "random" raid groups are doing a very
poor job (or no job) at managing the raid. They just open a group, expect you to have 82k DPS and let's go! This was basically examples on why your DPS in trials is often lower then the trial dummy. Next we got how to maintain a good DPS.
How do you stop loosing (too much) DPS?
The most important thing is:
Don't expect to much! I have seen more groups succeed without a "DPS Limit" (i.e. you will be asked by raid lead to do x amount of DPS) then with a DPS Limit. The reason is pretty simple: I'd prefer somebody with 10k less DPS, but being able to
maintain this DPS - over somebody with +10k DPS, but
unable to deliver it in the heat of the battle. Yeah i take 30k DPS with me and succeed heavy veteran trials,
asking 50k - 60k DPS is just unrealistic. Not saying it's impossible.
Skilled players will be able to achieve and maintain this DPS, the majority does not however. So as mentioned before here are some crucial Tipps for maintaining your DPS (Keep in my i'm nowhere near a professional DPS master myself, just personal experience):
- Re-casting spells when the boss moves
- Preparing with the right sets and debuffs / buffs
- Using different Buff Food / Heavy attacks (!)
- Learning mechanics (!) - A dead DPS is no DPS
- Don't aim for the highest amount of DPS - Aim for what is possible to YOU
Re-casting your abilites will often
cost a lot more resources then you planned to use. However you will have to do this in at least half of all trials. The aetherian archive for example has bosses that for the most part just stand still. The cloudrest however phew those bosses like to move a lot. If you're doing 50k in vAA, but only 30k in vCR then that's one of the reasons.
In hand with this goes the choice of sets. If you have to re-cast your abilities a lot, is it worth it taking sets that increase your resource regeneration like wormcult? It probably is! Yeah you "loose" one DPS. 2 were doing fine anyway, but you maintained the DPS of the other 6, which is certainly worth it. Don't ask the healers to run it, because they gotta heal trough your mistakes. In trial guilds were everybody knows mechanics it might make sense to ask a healer to wear it, but not in random groups.
If there is no set available, then you could consider using different
buff food that grants you more recovery for when you need it. Every single player should be
having at least 2 different types of buff food in their reach (inventory or mobile banker).
Learning when the bosses move where is essential to maintaining your DPS. Yeah sometimes they move rather randomly, but if you pay close attention to z'Maja (example) you'll notice a little shadow coming off her when she moves, giving you a rough idea on where she is going and you can be there ready with your trap or endless hail. Also if you die - not only do you loose 1 DPS but TWO! Because somebody has to resurrect you.
If you're trying to achieve the highest DPS possible and get stuck in your rotation without analyzing the situation, then you should re-think what you're doing and aim for a DPS that is more relaxing to you. Hell if you 30k DPS, but constantly then you're better then somebody doing 50k DPS but only half of the time. If a raid lead is asking you for 50k DPS and you know you can only achieve this under high pressure - don't go for it.
Short version
All in all - and i can't say this often enough -
most raid expectations are simply unrealistic. The videos you see often feature DMG - Only builds, where they have buff food that only gives stamina / magicka, but no life. They automatically have more DPS then in a raid, where you should have at least 17k+ Life. If you join a raid with 12k Life - Don't bother coming. The chain lightning in vAA for example will just one-shot you every time somebody moves and they move a lot in random groups. Start preparing for your veteran trials a bit more. Use different sets (or even classes - talking about minor breach from templar here) and i can guarantee you - you will have more success then before. There is always some wipes, sometimes it gets disbanded, but generally speaking you'll have more success. 30 Day Money- Back guarantee here. If people tell you, that every player for vet trials should do 50k+ DPS just tell them they suffer from a reality loss here. Don't get discouraged and learn the mechanics. Again:
LEARN - THE - MECHANICS! It takes nothing to just
go on YouTube and watch a vSS guide while the servers are down. At least you have seen it once then.