What was the top DPS of each expansion?

[Overdispersion]

I think 4-5K was legendary geared hunters after the LK prepatch. Before that I don't think even top raiders broke 3K. For average T5-T6 raiders only a few well geared, well supported destro locks and arcane mages broke 2500...

Rogues and hunters (even without the bow) were better than locks and mages. The top dps on Kil'jaeden progress were usually at 2.5k and I remember 3.5k dps by hunters with Thoridal and BiS gear, but there's no effing way people did 5k before prepatch which I don't think should be counted.

[Tojara]

It REALLY depends on what hoops you wanted to jump through and what encounters you're basing them off of.

Vanilla - 1K was the absolute highest, but this could only be achieved by fury warriors on a fight like patchwerk with literally every world buff active. Realistically, 650-800 is what you would normally witness and rogues, warriors and mages would achieve this.

TBC - 2.5-3.3K before the 3.0 patch. Hunters with legendary, warlocks with good crit RnG, and rogues/warriors with legendary items would get DPS like this.

WoTLK - 18-20k was what you would be looking at WITHOUT the buff. Remember ICC had some 30% buff, inflating numbers.

Cataclysm - 50-60k, lots of classes in those areas

MoP - 375-500k, huge spread depends if you include tanks and what encounter. Can obviously go higher but typically multi dot encounters or encounters with lots of AoE.

All of these numbers are what I witnessed and aside from Vanilla, and Kil'Jaeden in TBC I've completed all the content when it was relevant and typically have ranked really well on my rogue/DK. Basically I kept up with it. Those numbers are pretty accurate representation of what to expect back in those eras. Obviously there are outliers, but I don't count pre-expansion patches nor those circumstances where people setup encounters perfectly for individuals. 4k DID happen in TBC, but it was only when the 3.0 patch came out for example.

During Sunwell, without double warglaives (I had one) the absolute highest DPS I achieved on Brutallus was 3k exactly. With warglaives that would be pushed up by another couple hundred. Hunters with the legendary would go above 3k as well, and with good crit RNG in addition to 3-4 warlocks present in a raid (which was actually quite common) you could see geared warlocks sometimes get 3k parses as well. Typically however the ~2.5-2.8k was what you would see from warlocks.

Keep in mind back then there wasn't a lot of DPS CDs for a lot of classes, there were more buffs and potions could be used in combat along with bloodlust not having the sated effect. This made huge DPS swings between encounters because of crit RnG and fight length.

[Tradu]

I think this is grossly overcooked.

Vanilla was, to my knowledge, nowhere near 1k DPS on average - 700 to 800 was about as good as the average well-geared player got. I do stand to be corrected on that, though.

During Outland, nobody was doing 4 to 5k on average - the average, in top end gear, wasn't even 2k. Method's first Kil'jaeden kill, for example, see's the rogues not able to get above 2.5k, never mind the crazy numbers being quoted, and their uptime was very high. Against the Lich King on heroic, Paragon's top DK was managing around 14k (slightly less) so, again, the 20k number is grossly overstated, even considering the downtime on Arthas. As for Cataclysm, you'd probably have to pick a fight like Blackhorn with decent uptime and Method's top guy was doing 48k so at least that number is relatively accurate, but still too high for the average player.

As for MoP, just look at what Method were doing for Garrosh: and this is overcooking it by around 100k, which is quite a lot.

Now, obviously, it depends on when you meant and specific fights, but a cursory glance over end-tier fights tells you the story.

The best players were doing the following (ish):

TBC: 2.5k
WotLK: 14k
Cataclysm: 48k
Mists: 400k

These are the top performers, so it's safe to assume the average player was miles below the numbers quoted.

I did 13k+ on Saurfang on my feral in WotLK, and I was nowhere near heroic geared, so 14k being what the best of the best were pulling is just wrong. I remember seeing fury warriors going above 20k singletarget on WoL.
And Cataclysm... I still have logs of me doing 43k on Hagara LFR and 44k on Morchok LFR on my boomkin, one of the weakest singletarget specs(at the time I was probably a few pieces off BiS), and Hagara was almost purely singletarget, especially on LFR, and Morchok LFR is purely singletarget. So people doing over 50k singletarget definitely sounds more realistic.

[Puri]

TBC: 4-5k

Rogues on Brutallus with 100% hero uptime would do about 2-2.5k. It nowhere came even close to 4 or 5k (pre 3.0).

[Sussex]

Rogues on Brutallus with 100% hero uptime would do about 2-2.5k. It nowhere came even close to 4 or 5k (pre 3.0).

glaive'd rogues in my guild could do nearly 2800-3000 on brut without being bloodlust spammed pre3.0

with another mage being a scorch bitch for me i could hit 2500 on avg as a fire mage pre3.0 and that wasn't even with BiS sunwell gear, it was with BiS BT/Hyjal gear, and even i hit upto 2900+ several times on our fastest kills with RNG good luck on ignite stacking with constant fireball crits

[Lyaral]

The highest on Brutallus I ever saw was ~3.5k, by a hunter in SK gaming who got chain BL during the fight + a group setup to give him the best buffs sadly you cant access the log anymore.

WOTLK I seem to remember getting in the top 200 as a mm hunter with ~20k didn't have the Lich king items I suspect with the 30% buff and bis gear/class 25k would of been around the target maybe higher?

Cata - Highest log before mop pre-patch was 63.7k in the Us/Eu (66k for Korean but I think they got something extra that tier?) on Ultraxion

Mop - Hard to find a legit log seems 800k is possible by affliction warlocks

[Pua]

I did 13k+ on Saurfang on my feral in WotLK, and I was nowhere near heroic geared, so 14k being what the best of the best were pulling is just wrong. I remember seeing fury warriors going above 20k singletarget on WoL.

It's not wrong.

Look at the videos from before the 30% buff went live and people started scumbagging in order to rank.

[Tradu]

It's not wrong.

Look at the videos from before the 30% buff went live and people started scumbagging in order to rank.

But that wasn't the question. The question was "what was the top DPS of each expansion". That doesn't mean "top DPS during progression of each expansion".

[Pua]

But that wasn't the question. The question was "what was the top DPS of each expansion". That doesn't mean "top DPS during progression of each expansion".

I've already explained why I cited the numbers I did.

I CBA doing it again because you didn't read it.

[Bigbazz]

Where did you get 4-5k from in TBC? World first guilds were pulling like 2.5k, unless you're counting gimmick fights like Shade of Akama (where damage was only measured for the burst phase, which lasted mere seconds, I was 23rd in the world on that with 4.4k playing Fury), AOE or cheese mechanics (like mind controlling mobs in MH for haste buff). Under normal circumstances you would never really see above 3k, rarely see above 2.4-2.5k, Sunwell geared.

And WOTLK? So many gimmick fights, you could artificially boost your dps high on a fight like Saurfang by stacking tricks of trade/hysteria on a main target and with a top class guild you could increase Bloodlust uptime over the fight duration to gain a faster kill, thus boosting numbers, but in a normal situation the most you would be seeing even with full BIS, Shadowmourne and the 25% buff would be around 19-20k dps single target. People cheesed the tank damage buff on Festergut to inflate the numbers of a single player, people also cheesed the Rotface fight by ignoring mechanics to inflate dps by Cleave, people cheesed the Sindragosa fight to inflate the numbers on the Ice tombs (for aoe/cleave) and people even cheesed Heroic LK more than necessary to massively inflate AOE damage. Then you have Blood Princes, where you could cheese the fight by tanking 2 together and inflate dps by cleaving the 0% add (which has no benefit at all), and Blood Queen where you had a massive damage buff as part of the fight.

If you take away gimmics and cheesy inflation then the normal single target perfectly played in BIS gear with the 25% damage buff with a strong group (for good bloodlust uptime over fight duration) you're looking at around 19-20k dps.

[Skadovsk]

The top parse for Iron Juggernaut HC which is hard to pad is 1M, but that's for a tank so don't know if we should count that... Several +600k dps from aff locks though. However that's padding aswell since they all received TotT + the fact that the fight only lasts about 2min30sec with this current gear so you have a 25% heroism uptime + 40% Dark Soul uptime. Ridiculous.

How the fuck is that padding?

[AeneasBK]

How the fuck is that padding?

If all 3 rogues in your 25 man group are chain TotT on your affliction warlcok (who is also getting Unholy Frenzy from the DK) then he is "padding" in the sense that the raids focus for dPS output is being focused on one player.

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Our rogues were hitting 15-16k at 30% buff in ICC.

*I* was hitting 48k as ret (and I'm shit) on Ultraxion and one of our hunters was 60k+ regularly... (Cata)

[Notdev]

It's not wrong.

Look at the videos from before the 30% buff went live and people started scumbagging in order to rank.

The post asked for "average top dps among high end guilds". Not average DPS, or average top dps.

14k is way too low. And you can't really scumbag on a fight like Saurfang.

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If all 3 rogues in your 25 man group are chain TotT on your affliction warlcok (who is also getting Unholy Frenzy from the DK) then he is "padding" in the sense that the raids focus for dPS output is being focused on one player.

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Our rogues were hitting 15-16k at 30% buff in ICC.

*I* was hitting 48k as ret (and I'm shit) on Ultraxion and one of our hunters was 60k+ regularly... (Cata)

One of your hunters wasn't 60k+ regularly. There are zero 60k+ parses for hunters on WoL.

[Deleted]

According to proraiders right now #1 is 987477dps and its a warlock ofc. So 500k is weak

[Overdispersion]

According to proraiders right now #1 is 987477dps and its a warlock ofc. So 500k is weak

That's the average of his best dps on all SoO bosses. SoO is full of AoE and multi target encounters so that doesn't mean anything.

[announced]

wotlk 10k is definitly more accurate, highest was like 15k or so maybe 12
cata highest was around 100k. ultraxion logs will tell u that.
mop single target 500k is a bit generous, but doable.. id base this off iron jugg as its one of the most single target fights out there.


lol@987k. only on an aoe fight.

[Notdev]

wotlk 10k is definitly more accurate, highest was like 15k or so maybe 12

Not even close. Shadowmourne Warriors and Fire Mages had zero trouble topping 20k with the 30% buff. The better ones could top 25k, especially in ~3 minute fights. Hell, I remember guilds being able to 2 heal it with 2 holy paladins and killing the boss in 2 minutes or less.

We had something like 6-8 people top 10k on our very first H Festergut kill. That was before Shadowmourne, before getting anywhere close to full H 25 geared, and before even 5%.

If you want to disregard the 30% buff, it still translates to 18k+.

cata highest was around 100k. ultraxion logs will tell u that.

Preserved in history...
http://www.worldoflogs.com/rankings/...axion/25H/dps/

#1 recorded parse was 66k. Only 29 parses over 60k, all of them sub 4 minutes, many of them sub 3 minutes.

http://www.worldoflogs.com/rankings/...axion/10H/dps/

10H, #1 recorded parse was 70k in a 2:28 kill with 54 total 60k+ parses. All but a few are sub 3 minute kills.

Remember.. the question wasn't average dps or average top dps, it was average top dps among top guilds...

[Pua]

14k is way too low. And you can't really scumbag on a fight like Saurfang.

Of course you can; there was a lot of chain-Tricks/Hysteria going on in order to get people ranks, while not switching to the blood beasts. The 30% buff is also something that should be discounted when looking at the numbers.

Once more, and hopefully I don't have to repeat this again, I'm going off the numbers when progression was happening. I'm doing that because that's the DPS that matters, not the DPS people get when they wholly outgear the instance or have gotten the benefit of buffs/nerfs.

[Raiju]

Of course you can; there was a lot of chain-Tricks/Hysteria going on in order to get people ranks, while not switching to the blood beasts. The 30% buff is also something that should be discounted when looking at the numbers.

Once more, and hopefully I don't have to repeat this again, I'm going off the numbers when progression was happening. I'm doing that because that's the DPS that matters, not the DPS people get when they wholly outgear the instance or have gotten the benefit of buffs/nerfs.

Except a vast majority of players are keeping their subs up long after 'progression' for the world first is over, so in the grand scheme of things your numbers are entirely irrelevant to what MOST players experience.

So what if on the first week of the patch people did x? For the rest of hte 12 months SoO is out they are doing 2x. That is what people experience when playing most of the time, that is what the content involves now.

Your numbers are irrelevant to this thread, stop trying to defend it as if you didn't misunderstand the point from the beginning. The average top dps is well above what people do on world first kills, especially in SoO when the ilvl difference since then is over a tiers worth thanks to upgrades.

[Pua]

Except a vast majority of players are keeping their subs up long after 'progression' for the world first is over, so in the grand scheme of things your numbers are entirely irrelevant to what MOST players experience.

No, they're not irrelevant. Only to those who don't understand a point I've tried to make (and clearly) several times.