Melee dps easier then caster dps?

[Sinsyxx]

The first thing I want to say is that this isn't intended as a troll post QQing about how much better melee dps is. Blizz has come a long way in balancing classes and making different fights more friendly towards melee or caster from fight to fight.

The problem I have with melee dps is how much damage is "given" without doing anything. Using Recount on my warlock for example, my top 3 damaging abilities are, incinerate, Chaos Bolt and Immolate. All 3 require constant casting, even if that does mean spamming incinerate.

Melee Dps (and Hunters) almost always end fights with their top damaging ability being auto-attack. That means around 1/3 of their dps is given to them by right clicking on the enemy at the beginning of the fight.

What this all means is if a melee tops the charts at the end of a fight with 10k dps and a caster is second with only 8k then the melee seems to have "done" more dps. In all actuality though the caster has done 8k while the melee has only done about 6.7k (10k-1/3 of 10k)

Now this is how Blizz has made the classes balanced, so even though allowing casters some "free" dps would be logical it would make casters OP since they would become unbalanced. In my opinion melee should have to at least click a button to melee so they arent given so much of their damage with 0 effort.

[kosuko]

in general melee dps classes tend to be more forgiving for exactly the reason that you posted.. the main damage spell is auto attack.
Also melee in general tend to have easier rotations. "Melee in general" due to the huge exeption: feral druids.
Also, more instant cast attacks means it is easier to keep the dps going while moving (if in range of the boss)

[endless]

setting yourself up man...but a few simple points especially since you seem to have a warlocks perspective
1) dots keep ticking when your running most melee have 2 or 3 max
2) it must be nice not having to worry about getting vortexed out of melee range or have boss charge away.
3) casters have full resources to manage able to provide high burst and good AOE capabilities. Most Melee has limited rechargable resources sometimes (when unlucky or bad) leaving ONLY AUTO ATTACKS.
just a couple random points im sure ppl can expand upon pro and conversly.

[Aonix]

Melee has to move alot more from bad stuff at boss, melee usually loses alot of DPS by running etc.
Unless it's a tank and spank fight ofc.Also your playing the wrong spec as a Warlock at the moment, Destro is way behind on everything else.

[endless]

in general melee dps classes tend to be more forgiving for exactly the reason that you posted.. the main damage spell is auto attack.
Also melee in general tend to have easier rotations. "Melee in general" due to the huge exeption: feral druids.
Also, more instant cast attacks means it is easier to keep the dps going while moving (if in range of the boss)

do you play arcane mage or arms warrior?

[Volirus]

Cos bosses never move. You never lose time running from place to place, from add to add, dodging fire, avoiding cleaves etc etc.

Melee tends to be more forgiving with rotations perhaps, but certainly not with movement. Ranged generally has to run fewer paces to get back in a dps spot, whereas melee has to cross half a room and back, all the while doing 0 dps, apart from maybe a single ranged instant attack or dot still running.

[Felz]

I would agree with you, but then I started to think about it. I myself play a rogue, so I have very fast auto attacks, and I do tend to see auto attack being a decent part of my damage. But a white crit may only crit for say 1.7k, and a double mutilate crit would be about 2.2k + 1.7k in my gear. So with that, one press a button nets me about 6.5k damage. While a caster, say mage, can get much higher numbers with one press of a button. In my opinion its pretty balanced.

[RemJay24]

as a rogue... I still have to keep up my Slice and Dice to give me more "auto-attack" dps.

regardless. Blizz has is aware of this and WILL be fixing/adjusting it in Cata. (special attacks will do more dmg... auto-attacking will do less).

[Merlinsback]

Melee has to move alot more from bad stuff at boss, melee usually loses alot of DPS by running etc.

Stopped reading here... Melee can dps while moving, they don't even have to break rotation.

1) dots keep ticking when your running most melee have 2 or 3 max
.

As aff, if you have dot's ticking and have to run and can't spam sb your dps drops drastically. As destro if you have to move and have a immo ticking you could easily lose 1k dps.

You forgot that almost every fight melee get to stay on the boss with normal rotaion +cleaves in some cases, while casters have to switch to adds, move to get in range, and build up their dps again.

Playing both caster and melee, I agree, melee is a lot easier to have higher dps... but, casters are required to down the boss.

[schwarzkopf]

Melee is harder the higher your latency ... when you are 20yrds away your target is rarely 'behind you' for ranged.

With a latency of around 500ms, sometimes half the hits might be in the wrong place.

[endless]

Blizz has is aware of this and WILL be fixing/adjusting it in Cata. (special attacks will do more dmg... auto-attacking will do less).

- Source?

i think the balance is fine as is. AS i stated earlier the caster /mana type having all thier resource at start able to frontload dmg from a safe distance is balanced against a limited rechargable melee whose filler "auto attacks" provide a constant comabt.

only changes needed were odd specs like enhance shaman and of course hunters being mana based. Cata WILL adjust this and well see hunters come down to normal levels.

[Hendrixstorm]

Melee as a whole? No. They are all pretty simplistic.

Both extremes? No.

Feral druid VS. Arcane mage compared to Mutilate rogue VS Affliction warlock

One could also argue that a shadow priest is somewhat harder than affliction, and that's fine. But in either case, the differences between the extremes is not the same, the difference between the hardest melee and easiest caster compared to the easiest melee and the hardest caster is nowhere near compareable. Feral druid is much harder.

[Trivial]

Stopped reading here... Melee can dps while moving, they don't even have to break rotation.

I'm sure he meant something related to having to move away from boss thus not being able to attack.

But that's still bullshit, ranged moves just as much, and maybe even loses more damage done because of casting mechanics.

But it's hard to compare them, really, it's two entirely different mechanics. It's not like white attacks are exactly given to melee, keep in mind they need to keep their gear and caps up for even that to work, where ranged doesn't need to worry about that so much.

[mrOWNED]

Interesting thought, although, seems very unrealistic Blizzard would ever make an Auto-Attack button :P would kinda ruin the name, and every single melee would reroll. With that said, yes, hunters are OP they don't require much movement compared to melee's, and they also have insane "Auto-Attack" Dmg. But this is maybe for a reason? I think hunter's were designed for the casual bored player + - brainz (Doesn't matter).

But i don't think any DPS class overcaps another much in difficulity (Execpt kittens)

So i say, let the hunters be hunters, if that's what they want. I don't believe anyone want's a "Sims" styled wow where you right click everything and wank meanwhile ........(not that i have done that ofc)

[Fojos]

Melee has to move alot more from bad stuff at boss, melee usually loses alot of DPS by running etc.
Unless it's a tank and spank fight ofc.Also your playing the wrong spec as a Warlock at the moment, Destro is way behind on everything else.

Most fights in ICC it's the ranged that have to move / take stuff the most. Rotface and Festergut are very good examples, or encounters like Saurfang, where the ranged have to kill adds, and you do a lot lower damage to adds.

Hunters are probably the best, they can still move around a bit while DPSing (moving in-between autoshots).

[endless]

You forgot that almost every fight melee get to stay on the boss with normal rotaion +cleaves in some cases, while casters have to switch to adds, move to get in range, and build up their dps again.

Playing both caster and melee, I agree, melee is a lot easier to have higher dps... but, casters are required to down the boss.

you forget some cases where you cant stay on boss cause theyre flying around room like marrowgar or they are nova-bombing the raid and all melee must run out you may not notice these fights because they dont effect ranged but when you have to switch range to adds then all of a sudden you notice things like that. jsut look from both perspectives more.

[Deltamarine]

There's a lot of factors you're maybe not thinking of when considering this situation.

Consider a simple AoE fight (not the best, but just using it as a demonstration) between a shadow priest and a DK (a situation I ran into last night).

The priest can essentially stand in the distance and cast Mind Sear and put out somewhere north of 10k DPS in an ICC fight. The priest can essentially just re-cast Mind Sear each time the channel runs out.

The DK needs to apply Frost Fever (Icy Touch) and Blood Plague (Plague Strike) and spread them (Pestilence), then drop Death and Decay. The DK now needs to use Blood Boil and make sure to spread diseases or re-apply them and spread, as appropriate.

Now who's worked harder for their DPS? The DK's auto-attack damage will be paltry in this fight.

Now, that's just a simple AoE situation.

Now consider a single-target boss fight.

An arcane mage vs a hunter. Who's rotation is harder? Though there can be some subtly to the arcane mage's rotation, it's pretty simple to put out a lot of DPS with just three buttons. A hunter invariably has a lot more to watch, and many more abilities to use on most fights. Sure, the mage can't just right-click and attack the boss and win with "auto-magic", but their abilities are more potent to make up for it. A hunter that just right-clicks the boss is not going to be competitive and should be kicked from the raid.

Simply put, and as you stated, the respective DPS styles are balanced around this fact. In the end, in a perfect world, it should come out pretty close to the same damage output for any of the classes (minus the few gimped specs out there).

I just find it amusing that you say the melee class gets free damage with 0 effort. If both players are contributing, then they are both busy for 90% of the fight using abilities. How interesting is a game where you have a big button called "Attack" that you mash... oh, kinda like combat rogues (I keed!). If the physical class' player is just right-clicking to start the fight and isn't constantly doing something active (just like a caster would be doing), then they're doing it wrong. Nobody will/should reward that type of play, so the point becomes moot.

[Fojos]

An arcane mage vs a hunter. Who's rotation is harder? Though there can be some subtly to the arcane mage's rotation, it's pretty simple to put out a lot of DPS with just three buttons. A hunter invariably has a lot more to watch, and many more abilities to use on most fights. Sure, the mage can't just right-click and attack the boss and win with "auto-magic", but their abilities are more potent to make up for it. A hunter that just right-clicks the boss is not going to be competitive and should be kicked from the raid.

I find hunter a lot easier and more powerful, because you lose a lot more from moving as arcane mage (it's not the rotations that make a dps class hard or easy, most of the time, it's simply how efficient they are).

[Exodus1811]

Troll post. My Feral is my main, but I raid on Mage, Paladin, and Warlock. If you think any rotation is hard you're doing it wrong, but I can promise you it's more difficult to keep up as melee as opposed to micro-manage dots, spam arcane blast, or any of the sort. If you think melee don't lose dps due to knock backs or boss movement gtfo, thanks.

[readytogo]

ok, I think your completely wrong, why? because although melee (rogues especially) get a big chunk of their dps from melee, that does'nt mean they dont have a rotation to keep up, while we do lose less dps when we fuck up our rotation, that does'nt make our rotation any easier. In fact I would venture to say frost dw dk rotation is just as hard as feral (I play both).

I cant think of any melee where they dont have atleast 5 different "dps" buttons to push, while some casters only have 2 (excluding cds for both melee and casters), I think you should actually play a melee and do competitive dps on high movement fights, before you bash us by trying to say we are "easier".

inb4 "you dont play ranged" in fact I do, I play an affliction lock and a fire mage, and while I find the affliction dot management harder than the fire mage 3 button rotation. both revolve around pressing the maximum amount of buttons in the correct order, or doing crap dps if you dont, melee revolve around that same philosophy.