Interpreting Combat Metrics

winged_tortoise

I'm working at improving my attack weaving and am not understanding why I'm seeing some of the things I'm seeing in Combat Metrics. First, on the info screen I'm seeing Heavy Attacks. My Light Attack clicks all felt like quick clicks. Is Combat Metrics Bugged or am I doing something that's turning my Light Attacks into Heavy Attacks?

Also, in the Bar Table portion of the Info Screen I'm seeing fields for Weav, Miss and Time. For example, under Barbed Trap I'm seeing 0.30 for Weav, 3 for Miss and 15.61 for time. Does anyone know what these fields mean?

Lastly, I'm using Light Attack Helper and Combat Metronome to help me unwind flaws in my attack weaving. While parse training should I be looking at the Combat Metronome Display to time my attacks or should I be looking at my screen graphics to make sure my skill is done casting. The Combat Metronome Display seems to change a bit while I'm parsing. I expected Combat Metronome to train me to click the correct click rate. Now I'm wondering if each skill has a correct rate and if I should be varying my clicking rate as I work through my rotation?

winged_tortoise

winged_tortoise

kojou

The difference between a Light Attack and a Heavy Attack is about .2 seconds. If you hold down your left click for longer than .2 seconds it will be a Heavy Attack. Fortunately you are not getting as big of a damage penalty for that, but that is why you are seeing heavy attacks.

Your light attacks per second are about .67 which is not bad. It will get better with more practice, but I think buff and DoT uptime is probably where you are losing more DPS.

Also given your current Weapon Crit chance you might want to consider switching to Thief and testing.

winged_tortoise

Thanks for the comments on Light and Heavy Attacks, Kojou. They're useful. I've never really worked on my Buff and De-Buff Up Times. That sounds like a good use of my time. Can you give me a little more info? I just ran a quick parse. Here are my Buff and Debuff uptimes. Do you have a sense for what I can work towards first.

I used to think I'd get the numbers I want by getting better gear. Better gear sounds nice, but now I want to hit the best I can with what I have.

Thanks for the help!

Viewsfrom6ix

Weave means the time it takes for you to cast another skill or light attack. Try to get this number as close to 0 as possible.

Miss means number of times you didn't light attack or cast a skill immediately after. For example, you cast two skills in a row or you light attack twice. The goal is to get to 0.

Time means the average time it takes for you cast that skill/attack again. Depending on the skill, you will want this as close as you can to the skill cooldown. This is a good indicator on well your buff and dots are kept up.

Hope that helps.

winged_tortoise

Thanks Views!! Really useful information!

kojou

So the first thing I notice is that you have 57% uptime on Venomous Claw. That should be an important DoT on Stamina DK.

I see that you are also putting Deadly Cloak in your rotation, but if you are not using the Blackrose Prison Dual Wield weapons then this isn't going to increase your DPS.

I also don't see Major Brutality and Major Savagery only has a 45% uptime. Those are both very important buffs. Most players get them from potions, but you can get Major Brutality by through Molten Armaments and Major Savagery by slotting Camouflaged Hunter or Flames of Oblivion (having this on your "back bar" is why you have 45% uptime) if you don't want to craft/buy the potions.

Are you switching to Whirling Blades as your spammable at around 25%? The DPS from your parse wasn't showing it so I wasn't sure.

winged_tortoise

Thanks Kojou! I do have pots, but I don’t use them for parsing. Yes, I swap to Whirling Blades.

Question, do you keep your pots on cool down? So far I only use them when I run out of stamina.

I’m wondering what decreasing the weave times and misses will do for my dps. I feel I’m quickly improving and may soon find out.

Thanks again for the replies. Any more recommendations? Thanks!

WrathOfInnos

Yes pots on cooldown, and make sure you have the Alchemy passive Medicinal Use so that the effects last longer than the potion cooldown. You’ll need all the sustain you can get when you switch those 3 jewelry enchants from stam recovery to weapon damage.

kojou

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

Yes pots on cooldown, and make sure you have the Alchemy passive Medicinal Use so that the effects last longer than the potion cooldown. You’ll need all the sustain you can get when you switch those 3 jewelry enchants from stam recovery to weapon damage.

I missed that detail... yes definitely switch your jewelry to Weapon Damage.

One more "pro tip" is to practice on the PTS server instead of your own account on the live server. You can make whatever combination of gear and class you want pretty much, and use potions that you can craft infinitely for free, then once you get really good come back to live and do your parse for real.

winged_tortoise

Thanks guys! I didn't even realize I lacked a damage enchant on my jewelry--Fixed! I already have maxed out medicinal use. Now I have a new problem. I run out of stamina. On a 3 mil target my Essence of Weapon Power pots are enough to get me though, but on a 6 mil I end up standing around the last few rotations and my DPS CAVES. Perhaps I need to try another Pot or find a way to sneak out a little more DPS and finish up the 6 mil before I run out of Stamina.


At 0.78 my light attack ratio still needs some work and with 6 misses coming out of my Stone Giant there is still some work to do, but things are improving!

Thanks again for all the help. It's really helped!