How complex should DPS rotations be?

[Deleted]

"Lol...DPS is faceroll" is an expression uttered by many, mostly non-DPS, players.

And while DPSers don't generally carry as much responsibility as tanks or healers do, they often use just as many abilities and get to interact with the environment, rather than raid-frames.

On the other hand, it is no secret that there is a varying complexity level between different DPS speccs, ranging from "JOHN F******* MADDEN" to "1212121212etc".

The complexity can be as high as: Feral Druids, Affliction Warlocks, Enhancement Shamans or Shadowpriests...

...or as simple as: Arcane Mage, Mutilate Rogue and Retribution.


Now Blizzard has a couple of mechanics implemented that affect our DPS rotations: Ability proccs (like instant Slam), Cooldown Management (Arcane Power/Evocation), Dots with cast-time (require pre-casting) and stacking buffs/debuffs (Shadow Weaving).

Now not all classes need to watch all of the above. Most have a few selected mechanics woven into their nuke rotations.

But what do you consider the right complexity level for a DPS class in PvE?

Should every class use at least 5 abilities within a 20 second window? Or are 3 enough?

How many proccs can we expect a class to manage before things get chaotic? 1 or 3?

Does every class really have to have a DPS cooldown to burn? After all some are without.

Is it ok for a DPS class to have a simpler rotation as long as they have to manage other abilities or buffs like Totems or Hand of X?

Is it ok if Melees have a more forgiving rotation as their proximity to the target generally puts them at a greater risk and restricts their pov?

Can a DPS specc be pushed to far regarding its complexity or is anything fair game as long as it scales with skill?

How big should the gap between a bad, a mediocre and a good player be when DPSing? 50%/80%/100% or closer to 30/60/100?

I'd be interested in your opinions regarding DPS mechanics in WoW.


Edit: Please retain from having these pointless "Specc A is harder than Specc B debates." That's really not what this thread should be about. We all know there are specc of varying complexity and this thread should be about the sweat-spot. If you want to compare dick-size just go to chatroulette like everyone else.

[Laukkanen]

Don't know really. I assume all of the rotations get extremely easy once you do it over and over. My main is a Marksman hunter, not a hard rotation at all, on the other hand I have been MM for 5 months or so now so if the rotation was still difficult I'd suck.

[MushroomBomb]

Personally, I feel like the Shadow Priest rotation is near-perfect. The only thing that would make it better in terms of complexity would be adding in a proc of some sort (presumably tied to either Mind Blast or Shadow Word: Death) to juggle in between Mind Blast cooldowns and DoTs.

I also play a Feral Druid and, while it's certainly very fun, I find that I feel like it's too hard on mistakes. But yeah, somewhere around the complexity of the Shadow Priority + 1 would be fantastic. Sadly, this can probably never be achieved with all classes.

[Aliadra]

Personally, I feel like the Shadow Priest rotation is near-perfect. The only thing that would make it better in terms of complexity would be adding in a proc of some sort (presumably tied to either Mind Blast or Shadow Word: Death) to juggle in between Mind Blast cooldowns and DoTs.

I also play a Feral Druid and, while it's certainly very fun, I find that I feel like it's too hard on mistakes. But yeah, somewhere around the complexity of the Shadow Priority + 1 would be fantastic. Sadly, this can probably never be achieved with all classes.

MushroomBomb pretty much explained my opinion on this matter.
Having a feral alt for a while, I found that dropping a FB and having some bad luck on OOC proccs can REALLY hurt your dps and mess up your entire "rotation" for up to a minute, if not more.

[Balance]

I play a shadow priest, and the difficulty really isn't even that bad. I've done a raid as 3/4 specs you said up there and all it takes it a bit of practice and knowing what the buttons you're pressing are doing. If you MB with VE up you give the raid replenishment. If you throw up Shadow Word: Pain without 5 stacks of shadow weaving your dps drops. If you Shred without mangle up you do less damage. If you lava lash without flametongue? Well...

That type of system is what I expect from a raiding dps spec. /startrant Idk where it was decided to be ok for arcane mages to have a 2 button rotation (Or somewhere near, I will admit I have never raided on one) and be able to pull the amazing dps they do. Is it because they are a pure dps class? If that is the case then hybrids that will often have the more difficult rotation are getting screwed in my opinion. /endrant

But as I was saying, in my opinion like what MushroomBomb said, the shadowpriest rotation is a near perfect example of where difficulty should be. Your knowledge of what you need to do and ability to do it decides how high your dps is. There is little room for error (Although there is some) and if you manage to pull off your rotation perfectly, the meters will show it.

[Kpoof]

Enhancement shammies complex rotation? Have I missed something?

Disregarding totems, there is, Maelstrom for heal or instant spell, Lava lash, shocks and stormstrike. What's so complex?

On topic, a fire mages' DPS rotation is enough. It is simple enough to have a good learning curve, while being fun enough to not stop playing it.

Arcane mages, lmao. Fire mages are fun to play, you get to see big numbers, you have a great rotation regarding procs (hot streak), and you overall have very fun with it.

example:

Fire mage rotation;

Living bomb -> Scorch -> Fireball until you get Hot streak proc -> Hot streak proc -> Pyroblast <-> (refresh scorch, LB and fireball -> pyroblast)

a DK for example;

IT -> plague strike -> 2x blood strike -> obli / DS / SS -> runic dump -> (same rotation again, but instead of 2x blood strikes you do a obli / DS / SS if you have the death rune talents).

The fire mage rotation is fun, because you gotta still pay attention to things. As a DK, it really is a rotation, you follow it, and you will do top DPS basically. After a while, the DK rotation gets really tiresome, especially in unholy and blood. Frost gets the top notch here for the Howling Blast proc occasionally..

So conclusion, a fire mage rotation is really fun, just because of the living bomb and the possibility for multiple targerts.

[Themessiah]

Playing feral dps and affliction as my main alt, I would say both of these make me feel like I contribute to the fight by actually having to keep up with things. With affliction this I think is because of the insane damage you can pull just from hitting it right - and keeping it right. However, feral for me is more fun due to the ferocious bite nuke bombs you can drop - they really make you feel powerful. I like the complexity of the rotations, and I think it's a shame that there isn't still more reward in hitting it perfect, let alone making them easier.

[Avalanch]

Blizzard wants rotations to be more complex. Remember reading a blue post about them wanting rotations to be less forgiving. For instance.. they are supposedly changing Retribution so that it will require more skill to play correctly.

[waddlez]

Enhancement shammies complex rotation? Have I missed something?

uhh, yea you have

enh is the most complex rotation

1) Maelstrom Weapon x 5 stacks - Lightning Bolt
2) Flame Shock
3) Stormstrike if debuff not active
4) Lightning Shield if not active
5) Fire Elemental
6) Magma Totem if not active
7) Spirit Wolves
8 ) Shamanistic Rage
9) Earthshock
10) Stormstrike
11) Lava Lash
12) Fire Nova
13) Magma Totem
14) Lightning Shield

and this is all while having to move in most fights, deal with gcds, etc

[blizzardcashshop]

shadow isn't as forgiving as enhance or feral, all melee specs do a lot of automatic damage with auto attack + procs based off of that

shadow isn't hard, but you aren't rewarded for the work you have to put into vs other specs

so if everything was as hard as shadow (lot to manage, a lot to avoid to maintain solid dps, not much auto damage) then it would be fine imo.

feral is no harder to manage than aff or shadow but has more potential dps

people who can't play shadow well always say that feral is "as hard" and that's complete BS

if i mess up my shadow rotation just a little, i may do 8.5k dps instead of 10k, or i may go oom and lose more than that. on my feral or enhancement toons i can screw up and barely see a difference vs perfect rotation. a lot is going on, but clipping VT, MF or DP by .000000000001 seconds is a pretty big dps loss

shadow is just right, just doesn't have the upside of other classes. right now, the reward isnt' worth the work

[Balance]

Enhancement shammies complex rotation? Have I missed something?

Disregarding totems, there is, Maelstrom for heal or instant spell, Lava lash, shocks and stormstrike. What's so complex?

On topic, a fire mages' DPS rotation is enough. It is simple enough to have a good learning curve, while being fun enough to not stop playing it.

Arcane mages, lmao. Fire mages are fun to play, you get to see big numbers, you have a great rotation regarding procs (hot streak), and you overall have very fun with it.

example:

Fire mage rotation;

Living bomb -> Scorch -> Fireball until you get Hot streak proc -> Hot streak proc -> Pyroblast <-> (refresh scorch, LB and fireball -> pyroblast)

a DK for example;

IT -> plague strike -> 2x blood strike -> obli / DS / SS -> runic dump -> (same rotation again, but instead of 2x blood strikes you do a obli / DS / SS if you have the death rune talents).

The fire mage rotation is fun, because you gotta still pay attention to things. As a DK, it really is a rotation, you follow it, and you will do top DPS basically. After a while, the DK rotation gets really tiresome, especially in unholy and blood. Frost gets the top notch here for the Howling Blast proc occasionally..

So conclusion, a fire mage rotation is really fun, just because of the living bomb and the possibility for multiple targerts.

I don't raid as an enhance shaman anymore, but excluding totems (except for magma, as it is a huge part of your dps), you have to make sure flame shock is on the boss, use the priority system for lava lash, earth shock, flame shock, stormstrike, and fire nova, try to always pop wolves at the best possible time for the best dps increase while making sure that you don't let your magma totem drop and watching Maelstrom Weapon procs. That is a decent amount to watch if you ask me. Not as simple as hitting 3 abilities.

I also agree that a fire mage rotation, while still not HARD is definitely much more entertaining and fun to play. Procs like hot streak keep you on your toes as at any point you have a chance for a huge hit. And on that same note the death knight rotation is somewhat difficult, more memorization than actually having to watch what is going on though. You are fully right it is boring, and I blame that on the lack of procs if you aren't raiding as frost.

[SpacedOut]

First, I'll list the dps specs I have experience in 80 raiding with. Fire mage, arcane Mage, blood dk, unholy dk, combat rogue, muti rogue, ele shaman, ret paladin, balance druid, feral Druid.

What I like in a dps rotation is simplicity, but with a relatively high margin for skill to distinguish itself. I don't like the horribly overcomplex brainf***s such as feral Druid pre mangle duration buff, which while perfectly doable distract too much of your attention away from fight mechanics. On the otherhand I dislike ret paladin rotation, where there is little difference between the better ones and the worse ones.

By far my favourite is muti rogue, complex to start, simple to continue, but still demanding enough (watching energy levels, pooling, not clipping envenoms etc...) that there is an effective difference between good and bad players.

[MushroomBomb]

Blizzard wants rotations to be more complex. Remember reading a blue post about them wanting rotations to be less forgiving. For instance.. they are supposedly changing Retribution so that it will require more skill to play correctly.

At the same time, I think it's important to also mention that they've said how they want, for example, the Feral rotation to be a bit more forgiving.

[Laukkanen]

uhh, yea you have

enh is the most complex rotation

1) Maelstrom Weapon x 5 stacks - Lightning Bolt
2) Flame Shock
3) Stormstrike if debuff not active
4) Lightning Shield if not active
5) Fire Elemental
6) Magma Totem if not active
7) Spirit Wolves
8 ) Shamanistic Rage
9) Earthshock
10) Stormstrike
11) Lava Lash
12) Fire Nova
13) Magma Totem
14) Lightning Shield

and this is all while having to move in most fights, deal with gcds, etc

MM hunter

1: MD
2: Hunters mark
3: Sting
4: Chimera Shot
5: SS
6: AS
7: Aimed Shot
8: Silencing Shot
9: Kill Command
10: Rapid fire
11: Chimera Shot
12: Kill Shot
13: random shot

Just because you put a long list of random spells doesn't really make it complex. Especially not when you put some spells 2-3 times. Any rotation for any class can be 10-15 steps... Is that hard?

[Shiira]

a DK for example;
IT -> plague strike -> 2x blood strike -> obli / DS / SS -> runic dump -> (same rotation again, but instead of 2x blood strikes you do a obli / DS / SS if you have the death rune talents).

Frost is a lot more complex than this if you want to really do your maximum potential dps, and it's going to get significantly more complex in cataclysm.

[Sneakysnado@Gmail.com]

The fire mage rotation is fun, because you gotta still pay attention to things. As a DK, it really is a rotation, you follow it, and you will do top DPS basically. After a while, the DK rotation gets really tiresome, especially in unholy and blood. Frost gets the top notch here for the Howling Blast proc occasionally..

http://www.wowhead.com/spell=51130 doesn't exist.

[Kpoof]

uhh, yea you have

enh is the most complex rotation

1) Maelstrom Weapon x 5 stacks - Lightning Bolt
2) Flame Shock
3) Stormstrike if debuff not active
4) Lightning Shield if not active
5) Fire Elemental
6) Magma Totem if not active
7) Spirit Wolves
8 ) Shamanistic Rage
9) Earthshock
10) Stormstrike
11) Lava Lash
12) Fire Nova
13) Magma Totem
14) Lightning Shield

and this is all while having to move in most fights, deal with gcds, etc

Yes, that's what I said, I'm not counting cooldowns or totems, because that's not a "rotation". And as far as I know, the "flame shock" part isn't part of the rotation now since it provides a DPS loss on fights where you don't go out of range of the boss.

So, Lightning shield is an occasional refresh when everything is on CD.

Magma totem when it runs out.

Flame shock is proven to be a DPS loss in most fights.

CDs are being pulled whenever they are ready (that's why there are CDs, right)

Basically: Stormstrike -> Lava Lash -> Earth shock -> maelstrom whenever it's up. The other things you mentioned aren't less then any other class (Bone shield for example).

And about the DK part; Yeah, killing machine, make good use of it. I'm not saying it's not easy and I'm not saying it's not hard (because it really isn't), every class has some part of "pay attention" to it, but some classes suffer more from for example incoming mobs, like ferals, and they have to make up for it to not fall behind on DPS. Because Pestilence -> howling blast + look for killing machine proc is hard.

[PrettyBiased]

none of these things matter, good players will always adjust and bring their character to its full potential. If things become hectic addons managing them will be made

[Sorx]

Depth> Complexity.
Theres no skill in knowing a rotation, all become easy. Skill is when you step away from that rotation and do whats best for a specific situation.

[Screwtape]

Should every class use at least 5 abilities within a 20 second window? Or are 3 enough?

How many proccs can we expect a class to manage before things get chaotic? 1 or 3?

Does every class really have to have a DPS cooldown to burn? After all some are without.

I think these 3 questions can be responded to in the same way. There will be discrepancies in the capabilities of the DPS classes as long as there are discrepancies in their design. I highly doubt that you could achieve parity without homogenizing the classes to a large extent. I'm willing to allow for some injustice for the sake of interesting diversity.

Is it ok for a DPS class to have a simpler rotation as long as they have to manage other abilities or buffs like Totems or Hand of X?

I can't think of a class that has such a large utility role that it would impact their dps to a major extent. Totems are click once per fight and you would only use an ability like HoF or Salv once or twice on most fights.

Is it ok if Melees have a more forgiving rotation as their proximity to the target generally puts them at a greater risk and restricts their pov?

*Incoming ranged rant* Melee complain a lot about how hazardous their jobs are and I don't buy it most of the time. 95% of the time they are 1) Gluing their faces to the boss' ass the entire fight 2) Increasing their damage exponentially by killing several small adds. The only boss in this expansion that I can think of that was hazardous to melee is Emalon.

Can a DPS specc be pushed to far regarding its complexity or is anything fair game as long as it scales with skill?

Rotations are fun, but I think boss fights are more so. The more complex rotations are, the less attention you can devote to the mechanics of the fight, which I think would lead to a generally more boring game.

How big should the gap between a bad, a mediocre and a good player be when DPSing? 50%/80%/100% or closer to 30/60/100?

In a perfect world, it would be 'linear'. Unfortunately there is no measure of a person's skill. I think right now a bad player would do about 75% damage as a good player. For instance, in 25 man ICC, a not very good player might do 8k, a decent player would do 10k and a really good player would do 12k. Adjusting for class, gear, etc.

I'd be interested in your opinions regarding DPS mechanics in WoW.

Enjoy my unsubstantiated ramblings. xD