Stam dk rotation help

SASQUATCH0 · December 2017

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TheNorthernDragon · December 2017

Several questions for you come to mind first:

•How close are you to the penetration cap?
•What mundus stone are you using?
•What traits are on your armor and weapons?
•What enchantments are on your armor and weapons?
•Are you self-buffing with potions and food?
•Are you animation cancelling?
•Do you have a vMA bow?
•Which monster set are you using on your head and shoulders?

Keep in mind that TFS gives you great results on training dummies and in solo play, but is not recommended for use in trials groups, as it adds nothing for the group.

There are several highly informative discussions previously posted on the forums that might also help you. I can't look right now, but I'll dig them up for you later, if you wish. You really want to talk with guys like @Oreyn_Bearclaw, @hedna123b14_ESO (Nos), @cpuScientist,
@Izaki, @Danksta, and several others here. I'm no elite player, I just take a lot of notes!

Lastly, check out:
Alcast (https://alcasthq.com/eso-stamina-dragonknight-build-pve/) and
Nos (http://tamrielfoundry.com/topic/noss-poison-knight-stamdk-build-db-ready/) for more detailed build advice, and
Alcast's stamina optimization guide (https://alcasthq.com/eso-stamina-optimization-raids/).
These guides are not up-to-the-second on things like the best trait for your main hand dagger, but will give you an excellent grounding and good general knowledge on the things you want to learn.

There's also a discussion right below this one that will also help!

SASQUATCH0 · December 2017

TheNorthernDragon wrote: »

Several questions for you come to mind first:

•How close are you to the penetration cap?
•What mundus stone are you using?
•What traits are on your armor and weapons?
•What enchantments are on your armor and weapons?
•Are you self-buffing with potions and food?
•Are you animation cancelling?
•Do you have a vMA bow?
•Which monster set are you using on your head and shoulders?

Thanks for taking time to reply.
To answer some of these questions:
• I currently have about 20 champions points into pen.
•I have a precise vma bow, might change it to nirnhoned.
•to answer the rest of these I pretty much mirrored alcast as build.

Oreyn_Bearclaw · December 2017

SASQUATCH0 wrote: »

TheNorthernDragon wrote: »

Several questions for you come to mind first:

•How close are you to the penetration cap?
•What mundus stone are you using?
•What traits are on your armor and weapons?
•What enchantments are on your armor and weapons?
•Are you self-buffing with potions and food?
•Are you animation cancelling?
•Do you have a vMA bow?
•Which monster set are you using on your head and shoulders?

Thanks for taking time to reply.
To answer some of these questions:
• I currently have about 20 champions points into pen.
•I have a precise vma bow, might change it to nirnhoned.
•to answer the rest of these I pretty much mirrored alcast as build.

If you are at 32K, you are closer than you think. My guess is that you are lacking in penetration, and maybe your weave needs a bit of work. If you were at say 25k, then I would probably want to dissect your rotation a bit more. Any idea what your base penetration is?

Think of sets in 3 ways: Damage sets, Penetration sets, and buff sets.

On a DK, your most obvious damage set is hundings, followed by Vicious ophidian. Both are going to boost raw DPS very well, but not as well as a penetration set until you are at the cap. Hundings is more Damage, VO is more utility. The only way you would ever run both at the same time would be if you were told to go full damage in a raid, because all the other sets were covered.

Your Penetration sets are NM, Sunderflame, Alkosh, TFS, Spriggans. The first 3 are group sets, the last 2 are personal sets. For parsing, you dont care about your group, so your best set will be TFS. Spriggans is not a bad subsititue, but as you will never use it in a trial, it's hard for me to recommended farming/buying it just to cheese a dummy parse.

Really the only relevant buff set is Morag Tong. I would not suggest using it on a dummy. Assuming you have 4 stamina in the group, you have 8 5-piece damage sets. Morag Tong merits a spot if you have 2 DKS or more, but otherwise, I wouldnt run it. You also would not run it until NM, Sunder, and Alkosh (probably times 2) are accounted for.

Monster set: For a monster set, kraghs is definitely your best parse setup, but not your best trial setup. If you want to cheese a parse, defintiley wear kraghs. For trials, go velidreth.

TLDR: if you want to maximize DPS on a dummy without any assistance, you need to stack penetration. From a gear standpoint, your best bet is probably TFS/NM/Kraghs. NM might be overkill, in which case, Hundings is your best replacement. Your best substitute for TFS when solo is probably Spriggans, but another reallys strong groupbuff option would be sunderflame. It's not quite as much pen, but its actually a useful set, and a DK rotation should give you a very high uptime on the buff.

SASQUATCH0 · December 2017

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

SASQUATCH0 wrote: »

TheNorthernDragon wrote: »

Several questions for you come to mind first:

•How close are you to the penetration cap?
•What mundus stone are you using?
•What traits are on your armor and weapons?
•What enchantments are on your armor and weapons?
•Are you self-buffing with potions and food?
•Are you animation cancelling?
•Do you have a vMA bow?
•Which monster set are you using on your head and shoulders?

Thanks for taking time to reply.
To answer some of these questions:
• I currently have about 20 champions points into pen.
•I have a precise vma bow, might change it to nirnhoned.
•to answer the rest of these I pretty much mirrored alcast as build.

If you are at 32K, you are closer than you think. My guess is that you are lacking in penetration, and maybe your weave needs a bit of work. If you were at say 25k, then I would probably want to dissect your rotation a bit more. Any idea what your base penetration is?

Think of sets in 3 ways: Damage sets, Penetration sets, and buff sets.

On a DK, your most obvious damage set is hundings, followed by Vicious ophidian. Both are going to boost raw DPS very well, but not as well as a penetration set until you are at the cap. Hundings is more Damage, VO is more utility. The only way you would ever run both at the same time would be if you were told to go full damage in a raid, because all the other sets were covered.

Your Penetration sets are NM, Sunderflame, Alkosh, TFS, Spriggans. The first 3 are group sets, the last 2 are personal sets. For parsing, you dont care about your group, so your best set will be TFS. Spriggans is not a bad subsititue, but as you will never use it in a trial, it's hard for me to recommended farming/buying it just to cheese a dummy parse.

Really the only relevant buff set is Morag Tong. I would not suggest using it on a dummy. Assuming you have 4 stamina in the group, you have 8 5-piece damage sets. Morag Tong merits a spot if you have 2 DKS or more, but otherwise, I wouldnt run it. You also would not run it until NM, Sunder, and Alkosh (probably times 2) are accounted for.

Monster set: For a monster set, kraghs is definitely your best parse setup, but not your best trial setup. If you want to cheese a parse, defintiley wear kraghs. For trials, go velidreth.

TLDR: if you want to maximize DPS on a dummy without any assistance, you need to stack penetration. From a gear standpoint, your best bet is probably TFS/NM/Kraghs. NM might be overkill, in which case, Hundings is your best replacement. Your best substitute for TFS when solo is probably Spriggans, but another reallys strong groupbuff option would be sunderflame. It's not quite as much pen, but its actually a useful set, and a DK rotation should give you a very high uptime on the buff.

Thanks for the insight man. For my parses I’ve been using NM, VO and velidreth. Ive switched out NM (nirnhoned/precise daggers) for hundings (Sharpened daggers) but still hit around 32k. I will have to look into getting Sunderflame and TFS for more penetration on solo parses. Even if it feels like a cheese people in guilds still like to see numbers like 40k. Sometimes I’ll use my sharpened vma but will only see a 1-2k dps difference.

Didgerion · December 2017

Here is an idea - please note that I don't play a DK myself but I would use this if would:

PVE DK's strength is DOT. So you need a set to pump that up. Best in slot in my opinion is VMA dual wield weapon.

Cruel Flurry Set:
(2 Items) When you deal damage with Flurry, your next single target damage over time ability used within 10 seconds gains 2003 Spell and Weapon Damage

So just alternate Flurry + Dot1 + Flurry + Dot2 + Flurry + Downbreaker ulti(DOT)+ Flurry + Swith Bars + Poison Injection DOT + Buff up on that bar (And repeat)

And consider getting a Master Bow it will significantly bust your DPS of your rotation on a single target (this is what guild masters track anyway).
Also consider using sets that increases your ultimate generation -as you are all set on weapon damage by using VMA daggers (+2003 Spell and Weapon Damage that's a lot!).
Cheers!

SASQUATCH0 · December 2017

Didgerion wrote: »

Here is an idea - please note that I don't play a DK myself but I would use this if would:

PVE DK's strength is DOT. So you need a set to pump that up. Best in slot in my opinion is VMA dual wield weapon.

Cruel Flurry Set:
(2 Items) When you deal damage with Flurry, your next single target damage over time ability used within 10 seconds gains 2003 Spell and Weapon Damage

So just alternate Flurry + Dot1 + Flurry + Dot2 + Flurry + Downbreaker ulti(DOT)+ Flurry + Swith Bars + Poison Injection DOT + Buff up on that bar (And repeat)

And consider getting a Master Bow it will significantly bust your DPS of your rotation on a single target (this is what guild master track anyway).
Also consider using sets that increases your ultimate generation -as you are all set on weapon damage by using VMA daggers (+2003 Spell and Weapon Damage that's a lot!).
Cheers!

I have looked into this and does seem like a very good idea. I think this was bis before the homestead patch. But i don’t think it would possible to sustain using a flurry rotation anymore unfortunately

jkolb2030 · December 2017

Farm sunderflame daggers and transmute them to nirn/infused - poison enchant on nirn, wep dmg on infused. and the jewelry and run it with 5 hundings on the body with veli.

On a fluid, non lag/latency rotation you can hit 40k with what you have into your pen CP. On a casual every day rotating with a few hiccups its like a 38k, which is still very good considering its basically group gear.

On an optimized raid group parse, that 38k will transition into the 60-64k range.

These are personal numbers I've gotten.

Me and @Oreyn_Bearclaw had brief talks about this in a thread a few weeks ago or so (might have been about NMG?), and having sunderflame on your daggers with jewelry to keep hundings on both bars is a big DPS increase. It was like a 2-3k dps increase on my numbers, worth the farm.

SASQUATCH0 · December 2017

jkolb2030 wrote: »

Farm sunderflame daggers and transmute them to nirn/infused - poison enchant on nirn, wep dmg on infused. and the jewelry and run it with 5 hundings on the body with veli.

On a fluid, non lag/latency rotation you can hit 40k with what you have into your pen CP. On a casual every day rotating with a few hiccups its like a 38k, which is still very good considering its basically group gear.

On an optimized raid group parse, that 38k will transition into the 60-64k range.

These are personal numbers I've gotten.

Me and @Oreyn_Bearclaw had brief talks about this in a thread a few weeks ago or so (might have been about NMG?), and having sunderflame on your daggers with jewelry to keep hundings on both bars is a big DPS increase. It was like a 2-3k dps increase on my numbers, worth the farm.

Thanks bro I guess it’s back to farming chests in city of ass....

jkolb2030 · December 2017

SASQUATCH0 wrote: »

jkolb2030 wrote: »

Farm sunderflame daggers and transmute them to nirn/infused - poison enchant on nirn, wep dmg on infused. and the jewelry and run it with 5 hundings on the body with veli.

On a fluid, non lag/latency rotation you can hit 40k with what you have into your pen CP. On a casual every day rotating with a few hiccups its like a 38k, which is still very good considering its basically group gear.

On an optimized raid group parse, that 38k will transition into the 60-64k range.

These are personal numbers I've gotten.

Me and @Oreyn_Bearclaw had brief talks about this in a thread a few weeks ago or so (might have been about NMG?), and having sunderflame on your daggers with jewelry to keep hundings on both bars is a big DPS increase. It was like a 2-3k dps increase on my numbers, worth the farm.

Thanks bro I guess it’s back to farming chests in city of ass....

yeah man, that place sucks. Your best bet is to get a couple ppl and do vet and farm the higher tier chests. The boss drops f-all.

Oreyn_Bearclaw · December 2017

Didgerion wrote: »

Here is an idea - please note that I don't play a DK myself but I would use this if would:

PVE DK's strength is DOT. So you need a set to pump that up. Best in slot in my opinion is VMA dual wield weapon.

Cruel Flurry Set:
(2 Items) When you deal damage with Flurry, your next single target damage over time ability used within 10 seconds gains 2003 Spell and Weapon Damage

So just alternate Flurry + Dot1 + Flurry + Dot2 + Flurry + Downbreaker ulti(DOT)+ Flurry + Swith Bars + Poison Injection DOT + Buff up on that bar (And repeat)

And consider getting a Master Bow it will significantly bust your DPS of your rotation on a single target (this is what guild masters track anyway).
Also consider using sets that increases your ultimate generation -as you are all set on weapon damage by using VMA daggers (+2003 Spell and Weapon Damage that's a lot!).
Cheers!

@Didgerion
OP PLEASE don't follow this advice. This is wrong on so many levels. VMA DW weapons were Meta like a year ago. After the sustain changes, a flurry rotation is simply not sustainable. Even before the sustain nerf, people were already migrating to a Heavy Attack rotation on DK. Yes a DK rotation is mostly about DOTs, but you will get the most DPS by casting them all in a circular rotation with heavy attacks, then you will from trying to spam rapid strikes between half of them. You will run out of resources, have to resort to a HA spam anyway, and end up with less DPS.

Also, the master bow is not as good as the VMA bow for raw DPS. Endless hail is near the top of every stamina parse in the game, that is what you want to buff.

Lastly, are you really suggesting he run Bloodspawn for a monster set? Also, really bad advice. On a DK, stick to velidreth for trails and Kra'ghs for parses.

I of course could be mistaken, but I am guessing that you cant show me a 60k single target trial parse with the gear you have proposed. I can show you several with what I have proposed. I will of course objectively look at any info, but what you have is speculation that has been proven to be wrong.

jkolb2030 wrote: »

Farm sunderflame daggers and transmute them to nirn/infused - poison enchant on nirn, wep dmg on infused. and the jewelry and run it with 5 hundings on the body with veli.

On a fluid, non lag/latency rotation you can hit 40k with what you have into your pen CP. On a casual every day rotating with a few hiccups its like a 38k, which is still very good considering its basically group gear.

On an optimized raid group parse, that 38k will transition into the 60-64k range.

These are personal numbers I've gotten.

Me and @Oreyn_Bearclaw had brief talks about this in a thread a few weeks ago or so (might have been about NMG?), and having sunderflame on your daggers with jewelry to keep hundings on both bars is a big DPS increase. It was like a 2-3k dps increase on my numbers, worth the farm.

Yes, we have had the convo. Haha If you are running Sunder/hundings, then yes the min/max way to do it is with sunder weapons. I would love to see controlled testing with the setup both ways. I struggle to believe that it's really 2-3k on a dummy, but in a super optimized raid where you are pulling 60k+, I'll buy 2k for sure. I have seen several DK parses in the 60s with hundings weapons.

My pushback is as follows, even with perfect gear and a good rotation, very few players are actually pulling 60k+ ST. It's a fine goal, but you probably want to temper your expectations to some degree. 60k+ST requires a boss with very minimal movement, virtually no mechanics to speak of, extraordinary group support, and high DPS across the board to shorten the fight. It absolutely happens, but it's not exactly common. If you can hit 50k ST on a fight like valariel, you might not be breaking records, but you are certainly near the top of most groups (again, certainly not all). A mid to high 30's dummy parse will translate to the low to mid 50s in a good trial group, and might flirt with 60 in a really good group.

Edit: I guess my point is, farm anything you want to, but sunder daggers might not be my personal first priority. When I run sunder, I always do it on the body, and my DPS doesnt suck. You also might not always run sunder for your group. If you are pushing score in a trial group, and you are the designated sunderflame user, it's probably worth the effort, otherwise, I think you are splitting hairs.

RABIDxWOLVERINE · December 2017

@Oreyn_Bearclaw Hello again, I found your info very helpful last time we talked, I believe in the thread that @jkolb2030 was referring to. I have since farmed most of the sets that you recommended and have worked on my rotation. I'm better but still have a ways to go I believe. I haven't had to much time to mess with the dummy so I don't have numbers yet. I was wondering what sets you would mix for optimizing my DPS in a raid situation. Currently I'm running solo 4/5 Hundings, 5 TFS, and 2 Selenes still working on trying to get my veli helm, but I'm hoping to switch over to Veli this weekend. In a raid situation what would you suggest?

Basically how would you mix the sets minus the monster set? Would you go hundings/sunderflame or NMG/sunderflame? What are the best set combos for Stam DK DPS in your opinion? What are your suggestions as I have come to see you as a Stam DK guru lol Id love your advice.

The sets I currently have are;
1.Hundings
2. NMG
3. TFS
4. Sunderflame

Sets I'm still collecting;
1. VO (only need 1 body piece)
2. Alkosh (need 4 pieces)

Are there any other sets you would recommend me collect to improve my versatility?

Oreyn_Bearclaw · December 2017

RABIDxWOLVERINE wrote: »

@Oreyn_Bearclaw Hello again, I found your info very helpful last time we talked, I believe in the thread that @jkolb2030 was referring to. I have since farmed most of the sets that you recommended and have worked on my rotation. I'm better but still have a ways to go I believe. I haven't had to much time to mess with the dummy so I don't have numbers yet. I was wondering what sets you would mix for optimizing my DPS in a raid situation. Currently I'm running solo 4/5 Hundings, 5 TFS, and 2 Selenes still working on trying to get my veli helm, but I'm hoping to switch over to Veli this weekend. In a raid situation what would you suggest?

Basically how would you mix the sets minus the monster set? Would you go hundings/sunderflame or NMG/sunderflame? What are the best set combos for Stam DK DPS in your opinion? What are your suggestions as I have come to see you as a Stam DK guru lol Id love your advice.

The sets I currently have are;
1.Hundings
2. NMG
3. TFS
4. Sunderflame

Sets I'm still collecting;
1. VO (only need 1 body piece)
2. Alkosh (need 4 pieces)

Are there any other sets you would recommend me collect to improve my versatility?

You are certainly on the right track. It's hard to tell you exactly what to run in a raid, because I dont know what your raid has. You seem to have most of what you need. VO is really only necessary in a raid if you are asked to go full damage, in which case you would pair it with hundings. VO super useful in 4-man stuff and VMA, but Hundings is a superior set to VO for straight damage. TFS is really good for 3 scenarios. 1. You are solo (parsing), 2. you are the only stam in group, 3. trash fights. The first two are obvious, you dont have the group support, so TFS will help get you to the cap. It is also useful in trash fights in trials, because some sets like sunder wont have very high uptimes. Lots of groups have their stam dealers drop support sets in favor of TFS on trash.

If you can walk into raid an pair your hundings with any of the following: Sunderflame or TFS, you are in a pretty good spot. You cant pair hundings with NM, but you could craft NM weapons and pair it with Sunder for example. You can also pair NM with VO if you group needs NM and you need a damage set to pair it with. You could certainly look to add alkosh, for more versatility, but dont kill yourself for it. Lots of people have it. Just remember only one person in your group needs NMG or sunder. If both are already covered, that is where you could just run Hundings/VO for full damage. The only other 5-piece set that you might want to consider is Morag Tong. Morag Tong is worth a spot in your raid if you have 2+stam DKs (some argue its worth it even with one).

As to the monster set, Selenes is not my first choice, but it certainly works. Veli for raids, kra'ghs for dummies, but sounds like you are already on top of that. Good luck with RNGesus.

RABIDxWOLVERINE · December 2017

@Oreyn_Bearclaw Thank you very much... Again lol. So basically my set combos are going to be something like this;

Hundings/TFS
Hundings/VO
Hundings/Sunder
NMG/Sunder
NMG/VO
?

I almost asked why I couldn't run Hundings/NMG then realized its the jewelry lol work brain...

I'm really just trying to make sure that I have all my pieces covered so that when I switch to a set I don't have to completely rearrange everything for instance I have Hundings and NMG pieces all the same (weapons, chest, boots) then have VO, TFS, and Sunder in all the same pieces (legs, belt, jewelry). This should save me tempers and time in the long run.

What would your recommendation be for cp points in the penetration one (cant think of name atm)?

For vet MA would you recommend Hundings/VO or NMG/VO?

Just out of curiosity which combo do you think is overall the best or does it really depend on content/group?

Thanks again for all the sage like advice. I appreciate your presence on the Forum and if we were on the same platform I would totally pay for Bearclaw University!

Oreyn_Bearclaw · December 2017

RABIDxWOLVERINE wrote: »

@Oreyn_Bearclaw Thank you very much... Again lol. So basically my set combos are going to be something like this;

Hundings/TFS
Hundings/VO
Hundings/Sunder
NMG/Sunder
NMG/VO
?

I almost asked why I couldn't run Hundings/NMG then realized its the jewelry lol work brain...

I'm really just trying to make sure that I have all my pieces covered so that when I switch to a set I don't have to completely rearrange everything for instance I have Hundings and NMG pieces all the same (weapons, chest, boots) then have VO, TFS, and Sunder in all the same pieces (legs, belt, jewelry). This should save me tempers and time in the long run.

What would your recommendation be for cp points in the penetration one (cant think of name atm)?

For vet MA would you recommend Hundings/VO or NMG/VO?

Just out of curiosity which combo do you think is overall the best or does it really depend on content/group?

Thanks again for all the sage like advice. I appreciate your presence on the Forum and if we were on the same platform I would totally pay for Bearclaw University!

On a DK, I think Hundings VO is your best bet for VMA. On most other classes, i go NM/VO. The reason for this is that you have access to major fracture with Noxious Breath, so in a solo environment, you are way ahead of the game in terms of penetration. It's also why DKs are ahead of some other classes for self buffed parses. They dont need a tank giving them major fracture.

I am not a CP guru. I either rely on the constellations addon, or I just use whatever Alcast or Fear Turbo have on their website.

As to what's the best, I think some classes are better suited for some things than others, but for raw damage its likely Hundings/VO if all your other sets are covered on a DK. On a sorc, I think your best combo is Hundings/Automoton. Sorcs are great for running NM for example, because hurricane puts it on everything. Morag Tong might make more sense on a DK than a sorc, because they are doing a lot of poison damage. Sunder and Alkosh can really be run by anyone. Pretty much any Stam rotation done correctly will result in very high sunder uptime, and Alkosh is more a factor of your ability to smash synergies and your groups ability to feed them to you. One set we havent touched on really is war machine. That set makes sense on NBs, Wardens, and maybe templars, as they have low cost ultimates at their disposal.

Danksta · December 2017

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

RABIDxWOLVERINE wrote: »

@Oreyn_Bearclaw Thank you very much... Again lol. So basically my set combos are going to be something like this;

Hundings/TFS
Hundings/VO
Hundings/Sunder
NMG/Sunder
NMG/VO
?

I almost asked why I couldn't run Hundings/NMG then realized its the jewelry lol work brain...

I'm really just trying to make sure that I have all my pieces covered so that when I switch to a set I don't have to completely rearrange everything for instance I have Hundings and NMG pieces all the same (weapons, chest, boots) then have VO, TFS, and Sunder in all the same pieces (legs, belt, jewelry). This should save me tempers and time in the long run.

What would your recommendation be for cp points in the penetration one (cant think of name atm)?

For vet MA would you recommend Hundings/VO or NMG/VO?

Just out of curiosity which combo do you think is overall the best or does it really depend on content/group?

Thanks again for all the sage like advice. I appreciate your presence on the Forum and if we were on the same platform I would totally pay for Bearclaw University!

On a DK, I think Hundings VO is your best bet for VMA. On most other classes, i go NM/VO. The reason for this is that you have access to major fracture with Noxious Breath, so in a solo environment, you are way ahead of the game in terms of penetration.

I am not a CP guru. I either rely on the constellations addon, or I just use whatever Alcast or Fear Turbo have on their website.

As to what's the best, I think some classes are better suited for some things than others, but for raw damage its likely Hundings/VO if all your other sets are covered on a DK. On a sorc, I think your best combo is Hundings/Automoton. Sorcs are great for running NM for example, because hurricane puts it on everything. Morag Tong might make more sense on a DK than a sorc, because they are doing a lot of poison damage. Sunder and Alkosh can really be run by anyone. Pretty much any Stam rotation done correctly will result in very high sunder uptime, and Alkosh is more a factor of your ability to smash synergies and your groups ability to feed them to you. One set we havent touched on really is war machine. That set makes sense on NBs, Wardens, and maybe templars, as they have low cost ultimates at their disposal.

War Machine is definitely a solid choice for a stamplar. I actually get my best solo results using it and get an ultimate up every other rotation.

kringled_1 · December 2017

I just want to say I am really appreciating all the advice given in this thread, even if so far I can't even come close to any of the numbers, I have a lot of ideas of things where I'm falling short.

Oreyn_Bearclaw · December 2017

Danksta wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

RABIDxWOLVERINE wrote: »

@Oreyn_Bearclaw Thank you very much... Again lol. So basically my set combos are going to be something like this;

Hundings/TFS
Hundings/VO
Hundings/Sunder
NMG/Sunder
NMG/VO
?

I almost asked why I couldn't run Hundings/NMG then realized its the jewelry lol work brain...

I'm really just trying to make sure that I have all my pieces covered so that when I switch to a set I don't have to completely rearrange everything for instance I have Hundings and NMG pieces all the same (weapons, chest, boots) then have VO, TFS, and Sunder in all the same pieces (legs, belt, jewelry). This should save me tempers and time in the long run.

What would your recommendation be for cp points in the penetration one (cant think of name atm)?

For vet MA would you recommend Hundings/VO or NMG/VO?

Just out of curiosity which combo do you think is overall the best or does it really depend on content/group?

Thanks again for all the sage like advice. I appreciate your presence on the Forum and if we were on the same platform I would totally pay for Bearclaw University!

On a DK, I think Hundings VO is your best bet for VMA. On most other classes, i go NM/VO. The reason for this is that you have access to major fracture with Noxious Breath, so in a solo environment, you are way ahead of the game in terms of penetration.

I am not a CP guru. I either rely on the constellations addon, or I just use whatever Alcast or Fear Turbo have on their website.

As to what's the best, I think some classes are better suited for some things than others, but for raw damage its likely Hundings/VO if all your other sets are covered on a DK. On a sorc, I think your best combo is Hundings/Automoton. Sorcs are great for running NM for example, because hurricane puts it on everything. Morag Tong might make more sense on a DK than a sorc, because they are doing a lot of poison damage. Sunder and Alkosh can really be run by anyone. Pretty much any Stam rotation done correctly will result in very high sunder uptime, and Alkosh is more a factor of your ability to smash synergies and your groups ability to feed them to you. One set we havent touched on really is war machine. That set makes sense on NBs, Wardens, and maybe templars, as they have low cost ultimates at their disposal.

War Machine is definitely a solid choice for a stamplar. I actually get my best solo results using it and get an ultimate up every other rotation.

I believe it. I just have very little experience on my stamplar, so I dont want to say things that I havent personally tested.

jkolb2030 · December 2017

@Oreyn_Bearclaw this is why I love having thread conversations with you lol - and yes the 2-3k was the raid parse number increase on the raid dummy; unfortunately on console, you can't see your individual DPS during the actual raid fights. You are totally right though, the difference between min/maxing is very minor when you have the rotation and group optimization down for a DK.

I think Oreyn has covered just about everything so far in this thread when it comes to gear set ups. I would weigh in that i would not personally run NMG/Sunder as a combo. I feel like it leans too much on the "buff b****", which ends up hindering that one person in the long run. I would always pair a buff set with hundings or VO - in this case i feel that NMG pairs best with VO. I've gotten better numbers with that setup in comparison to two debuff sets.

EDIT:
MY Raid Combos

Hundings/Sunder
Hundings/VO - pure damage and also my setup for solo content
Hundings/TFS - only on certain fights, hardly use it really.
NMG/VO
Hundings/Tong - I've never been asked to run Tong in my group yet, so i can't say to how this performs. May be able to swap out hundings for VO.

RABIDxWOLVERINE · December 2017

@Oreyn_Bearclaw @jkolb2030 @Danksta

Thank you all again for the great advice. I look forward to putting it into practice and becoming a better group member for my guild. Most the time I will be pairing something with Hundings and only in the event that we have no one running NMG that's when I should throw it on, Am I understanding this correctly?

jkolb2030 · December 2017

RABIDxWOLVERINE wrote: »

@Oreyn_Bearclaw @jkolb2030 @Danksta

Thank you all again for the great advice. I look forward to putting it into practice and becoming a better group member for my guild. Most the time I will be pairing something with Hundings and only in the event that we have no one running NMG that's when I should throw it on, Am I understanding this correctly?

For the most part, yes. As mentioned above, a lot of groups like to designate NMG or War Machine to a stamplar or stamsorc with the DKs responsible for sunder,tong, and one for full damage.

It's definitely a good idea to try to have all sets available to you (aside from War Machine).

Personally, I do:

Hundings/VO - VO jewelry and daggers, 5 hundings body (you can do hunding weps instead and 2 VO bodypieces)
Hundings/Sunder - Sunder jewelry and daggers, 5 hundings body (alternative same as above)
Hundings/Tong - Tong jewelry and daggers (again, i haven't run this yet personally but this is how I'm able to gear it)
Hundings/TFS - TFS jewelry and 2 body pieces, 3 hundings body pieces and weapons (you lose TFS stacks if you one bar it)
NMG/VO - VO jewelry and weapons, 5NMG body (alternative is NMG weapons, but you will miss 5pc for any bow bar crits)

Oreyn_Bearclaw · December 2017

jkolb2030 wrote: »

@Oreyn_Bearclaw this is why I love having thread conversations with you lol - and yes the 2-3k was the raid parse number increase on the raid dummy; unfortunately on console, you can't see your individual DPS during the actual raid fights. You are totally right though, the difference between min/maxing is very minor when you have the rotation and group optimization down for a DK.

I think Oreyn has covered just about everything so far in this thread when it comes to gear set ups. I would weigh in that i would not personally run NMG/Sunder as a combo. I feel like it leans too much on the "buff b****", which ends up hindering that one person in the long run. I would always pair a buff set with hundings or VO - in this case i feel that NMG pairs best with VO. I've gotten better numbers with that setup in comparison to two debuff sets.

EDIT:
MY Raid Combos

Hundings/Sunder
Hundings/VO - pure damage and also my setup for solo content
Hundings/TFS - only on certain fights, hardly use it really.
NMG/VO
Hundings/Tong - I've never been asked to run Tong in my group yet, so i can't say to how this performs. May be able to swap out hundings for VO.

Intelligent discourse often missing from these threads.

I do hear you on the whole Buff B**** notion. It honestly comes down to your raid. I agree that spreading around stamina debuff sets is generally the best way to go, unless there really is a notable skill gap in your stamina DPS, in which case, I might suggest making the low DPS were multiple sets.

Just for fun, this parse was from not long after morrowind dropped. I was in full Buff B**** mode. I was on a stam sorc running NM/Sunder. Both with very high uptimes, and not terrible DPS. If memory serves, we had 3 sDKS (or might have been 2 with stamplar). Nobody broke 60, but not a lot of people were doing that at the time. My own DPS would certainly have been higher on a DK. Only parse I can find were I run both. And yes of course, NM/VO is probably the best way to run nightmothers. On my sorc, I go NM/Automoton if I need to wear NM, but for DK, VO is what I would suggest.

Edit: There must have been a stamplar, unless a healer was running POTL, which I doubt was the case.

Didgerion · December 2017

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Also, the master bow is not as good as the VMA bow for raw DPS. Endless hail is near the top of every stamina parse in the game, that is what you want to buff.

@Oreyn_Bearclaw

Yeah VMA bow is supposed to increase the volley ticks with every tick - but it is not happening - as soon as you switch to your main bar the tick damage is not increasing anymore. Tested it on dummy.

Or is VMA bow on your main bar?

jkolb2030 · December 2017

Didgerion wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Also, the master bow is not as good as the VMA bow for raw DPS. Endless hail is near the top of every stamina parse in the game, that is what you want to buff.

@Oreyn_Bearclaw

Yeah VMA bow is supposed to increase the volley ticks with every tick - but it is not happening - as soon as you switch to your main bar the tick damage is not increasing anymore. Tested it on dummy.

Or is VMA bow on your main bar?

VMA bow is working, but because its a set bonuse now and not an enchantment you have to wait for the volley to actually hit before swapping bars. If you swap before your volley hits at least once, the multiplier does not apply to the DoT. Unless this is what you are saying is not working - a video would be great.

And yes @Oreyn_Bearclaw , you are 100% correct where the numbers difference is sooo minuscule when you dig down into, even if you are in 2 debuff sets - its all about how the group decides to optimize themselves. Again, all of my setups have really just been me/group trying to min/max the best we can. I am really jealous of PC having the metrics break down add-on lol. Great information.

Oreyn_Bearclaw · December 2017

jkolb2030 wrote: »

Didgerion wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Also, the master bow is not as good as the VMA bow for raw DPS. Endless hail is near the top of every stamina parse in the game, that is what you want to buff.

@Oreyn_Bearclaw

Yeah VMA bow is supposed to increase the volley ticks with every tick - but it is not happening - as soon as you switch to your main bar the tick damage is not increasing anymore. Tested it on dummy.

Or is VMA bow on your main bar?

VMA bow is working, but because its a set bonuse now and not an enchantment you have to wait for the volley to actually hit before swapping bars. If you swap before your volley hits at least once, the multiplier does not apply to the DoT. Unless this is what you are saying is not working - a video would be great.

And yes @Oreyn_Bearclaw , you are 100% correct where the numbers difference is sooo minuscule when you dig down into, even if you are in 2 debuff sets - its all about how the group decides to optimize themselves. Again, all of my setups have really just been me/group trying to min/max the best we can. I am really jealous of PC having the metrics break down add-on lol. Great information.

That of course is the most important part. Each group needs to sit down and figure out how they want to optimize their group. Hopefully, threads like these help that conversation be more productive.

Also, Combat Metrics is LIFE! Haha

Didgerion · December 2017

jkolb2030 wrote: »

Didgerion wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Also, the master bow is not as good as the VMA bow for raw DPS. Endless hail is near the top of every stamina parse in the game, that is what you want to buff.

@Oreyn_Bearclaw

Yeah VMA bow is supposed to increase the volley ticks with every tick - but it is not happening - as soon as you switch to your main bar the tick damage is not increasing anymore. Tested it on dummy.

Or is VMA bow on your main bar?

VMA bow is working, but because its a set bonuse now and not an enchantment you have to wait for the volley to actually hit before swapping bars. If you swap before your volley hits at least once, the multiplier does not apply to the DoT. Unless this is what you are saying is not working - a video would be great.

Thanks that explains it. Indeed you have to wait for the first tick to apply the set's effect!

Oreyn_Bearclaw · December 2017

Didgerion wrote: »

jkolb2030 wrote: »

Didgerion wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Also, the master bow is not as good as the VMA bow for raw DPS. Endless hail is near the top of every stamina parse in the game, that is what you want to buff.

@Oreyn_Bearclaw

Yeah VMA bow is supposed to increase the volley ticks with every tick - but it is not happening - as soon as you switch to your main bar the tick damage is not increasing anymore. Tested it on dummy.

Or is VMA bow on your main bar?

VMA bow is working, but because its a set bonuse now and not an enchantment you have to wait for the volley to actually hit before swapping bars. If you swap before your volley hits at least once, the multiplier does not apply to the DoT. Unless this is what you are saying is not working - a video would be great.

Thanks that explains it. Indeed you have to wait for the first tick to apply the set's effect!

I actually didnt know that. I almost always cast Hail first on my back bar, so I guess it never affected me. Looks like you definitely dont want to swap cancel it.

Didgerion · December 2017

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Didgerion wrote: »

jkolb2030 wrote: »

Didgerion wrote: »

Oreyn_Bearclaw wrote: »

Also, the master bow is not as good as the VMA bow for raw DPS. Endless hail is near the top of every stamina parse in the game, that is what you want to buff.

@Oreyn_Bearclaw

Yeah VMA bow is supposed to increase the volley ticks with every tick - but it is not happening - as soon as you switch to your main bar the tick damage is not increasing anymore. Tested it on dummy.

Or is VMA bow on your main bar?

VMA bow is working, but because its a set bonuse now and not an enchantment you have to wait for the volley to actually hit before swapping bars. If you swap before your volley hits at least once, the multiplier does not apply to the DoT. Unless this is what you are saying is not working - a video would be great.

Thanks that explains it. Indeed you have to wait for the first tick to apply the set's effect!

I actually didnt know that. I almost always cast Hail first on my back bar, so I guess it never affected me. Looks like you definitely dont want to swap cancel it.

I always swap-cancel it - as volley is my last skill in the rotation on that bar - looks like I'll have to adjust the rotation when using VMA bow.

SASQUATCH0 · December 2017

Glad I started this thread lol. Awesome Info guys thanks a lot

Mister_DMC · December 2017

Could also be a small rotation problem, I'll give you the one I use. Most recent test was 40k on the 3 mil dummy, pretty much always at like 38-39 and a bit and that's with Sunderflame, VO and kraghs. It's really easy. Skills, dw bar, venomous claw, Rending slashes, deadly cloak, noxious breath, molten armaments, flawless dawnbreaker. Bow bar, endless hail, rearming trap, poison injection, razor caltrops, vigor, standard of might.

Rotation starts by making sure you have an ultimate ready, usingapon power pot, molten armaments, blade cloak, walk up to the dummy and light attack into venomous breath.

Rotation, endless hail, light attack, rearming trap, light attack, poison injection, light attack, drop Dragon standard and swap. Heavy attack noxious breath, heavy attack, venomous claw, heavy attack, rending slashes, light attack, deadly cloak, swap back to bow.

The only thing that changes is every second rotation through after you light attack deadly cloak, you light attack molten armaments and swap. You do that to keep up minor brutality which lasts 20 seconds. When you have a dawnbreaker available, use it at the end of your DW rotation. You'll only have 2 Ultimates during a 3 mil dummy cause it dies so quickly.

Hope that helps, cheers.

RABIDxWOLVERINE · December 2017

@Ohhgrizyyy This is the tread I was telling you about in my reply to your thread on Stam DK sets. This has some great info in it! Enjoy and Happy Holidays!