Leading raids as a DPS?

[Deleted]

My main ist Warlock and I lead our raids since Classic. Surely i'm not the best DPS.. sometimes i miss my cooldowns or push some button to late because I always has my eyes on everything except me but it gets better if we downed bosses a few times.

If I have to raid with my Restoshaman and have to lead, I go crazy... it's nearly impossible for me to lead and to heal.


So yes.. it's possible to lead raids as DPS

[Entilzha2161]

I've found that throughout my raiding experience, dps raid leaders generally don't rank in the top 5 consistently (in 25 man) and generally do better on off-night fights when they're not in charge of anything.

[Malefic]

I raid lead world 19th guild as DPS.

It gets a lot of easier when you can play your class without having to look at your bars and think about your rotation. Just like on tanking you can focus on other things cause tanking doesn't require you to perform a near perfect rotation where as DPS does. When you can perform your DPS role without thinking about it or having to pay attention to your bars/binds then you'll be fine.

[mrgreenthump]

If you are really active at leading a raid, and you arent amazing at multitasking, your dps might be sub par, or you might miss something important on the encounter.. it shouldn't really be a problem unless you are in a progress race..

As a dps in general you just wont be looking at the raid dps or stuff like that unless you have something that could save the raid, and frankly there is little an elemental can do for a raid.. but as a tank or healer, your main job is observing the raid(and boss^^) anyways, so raid leading to those roles comes more naturally than for a dps tunneling the boss for that 0.1 % enrage kill..

[Deleted]

For me, leading raids as ranged dps has been easiest. Dps simply because it is less responsive. You often have rotations you can dream after a while, with a few procs very visible in your screen anyway. This ofcourse does differ a bit from class to class. A survival hunter is just optimal since it has only 1 proc, a 6 sec cd, a 30 sec cd and then a few big ones. Ranged dps have the advantage of always having a better view than melee dps. Tanking and healing are both way more responsive. As a tank (blood dk) I have to be responsive with my death strikes. I have to manage runes. I have to manage around 12 cooldowns I guess. In some situations I also have to monitor the other tank, at the same time. The only thing that tanks really have going for them is that they are pretty much paying attention in a wider scope already than dps, so they may have an easier time in that sense. Healers are usually the most responsive class of all while still managing both short and long cooldowns and their own mana. Their point of view does have some nice advantages tho. They can really see who fails and who doesn't. This advantage usually only comes into play after a fight tho.

To be completely optimal you definitely need a communicating healer, a communicating tank and a raid leader tho. Even in 10 mans having 3 (or if the raid leader is healer or tank 2) talking persons is just so much better.

[Deleted]

I raid lead as a dps personally. However I do see there being benefit for a tank raidleading as their job is more orriented in keeping an eye open for things to come up. Healers have their eyes a bit more glued to healthbars so that's a bit harder to lead.

Really comes down to the person and not your role.

[Coombs]

All of the people who want a guaranteed legendary raid lead as DPS.

[Easo]

I find it easier to lead or assist as a tank. I am almost always faced against the rest of raid, so i can see their mistakes and point them out, or warn about incoming adds, etc.

[Deleted]

Old school tanks could typically see their character's arse and little else as most fights had you backed up against a wall for all the cheesy knockbacks...

With that said they might get a better focus on the timers as they wont see anythign else anyway?

[ryotte]

I'm a healer and I co-lead with a hunter. He has more leisure to call things out when my time may be better spent saving someone's ass from imminent demise. My previous raid groups have been led by a lock and a mage. Wasn't a problem.

[almaderp]

in all honesty the largest factor is probably how much the rest of your raid needs babysitting... if you don't have to call stuff during fight you should be able to do it fine else you won't be preforming optimally. Practicing your rotation etc so you don't have to think too much for yourself during the fight will also make leading and dpsing easier.

[Deleted]

worst role for raid lead is definately heal because you constantly have to react to peoples hp bars with the appropriate healing spell. there's much less automation as with any other role.
i'd put melee dps as second worst because often there are more positioning requirements so you have to move more often. aside from always staring some creature in the back this makes for less of a clear overview.

now come the only two really viable roles for raid leading imho: tank & ranged.
tanking usually is quite relaxed. there are situations where you have to work your cooldowns or do some other random stuff like taunting or kiting so it's less of an automatable job when compared to dps. but you can learn that stuff for each encounter and once you've got cd timing etc down you're pretty much free to let your mind wander. you're still a melee though so you might not always have as clear a view as ranged/heal.

lastly, ranged damage dealer. this is imo the easiest and best role for leading a raid. especially simple specs like arcane mage, sv hunter or ele shaman really take the cake here. you always have a clear view of pretty much everything going on and you usually don't have anything distracting you from the fight itself except for the occasional proc.

so, if i was really serious about leading a progression raid, i'd pick tank or ranged dps (arcane mage, sv hunter).

regards,
zora

[Ryme]

Just like to throw this out there, I've found the easiest role to raid lead as is healer - and I'm finding it quite odd so many think otherwise. Healing really isn't that demanding, if you know how to do it. You either can heal someone or you can't and triage isn't a difficult concept.

[Yax]

I switched my main to my Warlock from a Blood dk at the start of t13. Yes, it's definitely harder to raid lead as a dps but after a while I got used to it (so basically, keep practicing and you should be fine!). I also raid lead alt runs as a Holy Priest, so it's definitely fine to do as any role, but I would say tank is easiest.\

EDIT: in t11 I raid lead as a feral dps and that was fine. Just make sure you're focused on everything! ^^

[Felade]

I've led raids in all four roles, and I think each has their strengths and weaknesses. In our raids, I am still technically raid leader -which means not much more than I am the guy who starts invites, hands out loot, and picks group setups. The rest we delegate. I would say we really have 3 raid leaders, and we confer a lot in officer chat about how we want to handle things, so it takes a lot of the stress out of the job. Sometimes one of us really gets a handle on the fight or a strategy and they take over.

Now, as to the strengths and weaknesses:

Tank - I've done it this way, and seen others do it this way. Strengths: tanks don't have much on their mind most of the fight compared to the other roles (obviously, fight dependent) so they have a bit more mental bandwidth to play with. Weaknesses: honestly, (whether they'll/we'll admit it or not), tanks miss a lot of stuff, and a lot of the stuff they have to worry about has nothing to do with what the raid is doing. So they may actually have to spend more mental bandwidth worrying about problems that have nothing to do with their role which is less true of the other two. Also, when a tank does have to pay attention, they have little room for mistakes (CD is up or you die) and their stuff usually happens really fast, and at wide intervals (so if you have trouble paying attention over long periods raid leading as a tank can be *bad*).

Healer - ok, people who say healing leads to poor awareness have never healed in arenas. Arenas are all about positioning and reacting appropriately to unpredictable situations, all while garnering near-constant harassment from your opponent's DPS. After coming in from arenas to raid healing, my first comment was (this was in Wrath too, the era of uber-reaction time healing) "why is this so slow? Is that *it*?" However, if you've only really done PVE, your ability to get out of the green bars *might* (key word here) be more impaired.

Strengths: I notice tank and DPS leaders don't always notice what's happening to the rest of the raid. Healer leaders are great for handling debuffs, CCs, and reactions like big raid hits. Depending on the player they are also *really* good at diagnosing problems and helping players out with positioning. As a healer, I can *always* tell who fails at flame waves on Rag. Weaknesses: Especially if they have little PVP experience, healers may not always see where the damage is coming from or why the raid or a player just took a massive spike. Also, some fights are designed to really challenge healers, make them spend every GCD appropriately and be really focused on keeping people alive through random spikes while also AOE healing and moving. They may have the least mental bandwidth to spare of the 3 roles.

DPS: Strengths: If you know your rotation really well, you can probably have the most raid awareness (especially if you are ranged). You can see the whole board. Also, a lot of obstacles are designed for DPS and you are probably in the best position to help struggling players with movement checks. I have spent many a raid night with a Star above my head for just such purposes. Except not in Dragon Soul - too much parking in Dragon Soul Blizz, please fix. Weaknesses: Sometimes, fights require the DPS to spend a lot of mental bandwidth too or really focus in on one thing (hello H Spine). DPS probably suffer the biggest performance hit if they are spending too much bandwidth on raid leading. Also, if you're a DPS that doesn't happen to play with raid frames, DPS can make some embarrassing statements over chat when it is *clearly* a wipe :P I always chuckle when I am healing those raids....

Stuff that I think can improve raid leading:

Focus on the player, not the class: You want your best team for progression, and unless your comp is *horrible* that is your best players. Bring the guys with the highest DPS and best awareness. Also, give people the chance to step up to the plate even if you aren't quite sure they're up to the task. Get your buffs covered, and any utility you need, but bring your best players.

UI: Fix your UI until it nearly does your rotation for you. You want enough (but not too much) info. Also, if you are a DPS or a tank, pull out some raid frames, for pete's sake.

Delegate: It is okay to say "I need help with this" or "what do you think about this?" Don't be a superhero, it just leads to burnout and drama. Personally, I think this is the biggest part. Our raid leading is freeform enough that all I'm doing really is a few chores and then I just play the game and help referee after wipes. I know and trust each of the roles to be able to diagnose problems from their perspective. Or at least, that's the idea....

in all honesty the largest factor is probably how much the rest of your raid needs babysitting...

This is a good point. Calling out is good, but only to a certain point. You can overdo it, and then your raid starts depending on your callouts instead of paying attention themselves. Find the balance point, and try to push your raiders a little further as you go. But nothing prevents more wipes like good callouts.

[Serb]

in all honesty the largest factor is probably how much the rest of your raid needs babysitting...

Sums it up nicely.

[Deleted]

Most of the previous posters sum it up nicely.

In my opinion it is more challenging to lead as DPS or healer, simply because these two roles require very different approaches. The standard raiding model was designed with the tank being one of the central components, with most of the raid revolving around the boss and the tank being in control of boss movement et al.

So you have DPS and healers being rather intensive in rotation and damage avoidance, adding on the role of call outs (if you do any), positioning and arranging who does what it can be much harder to focus on your role. In conclusion, yeah it's possible to do well but takes more practise in my opinion. My solution if I wasn't managing my raid well enough would be to delegate to trustworthy players who can handle the extra roles well. But anyways, good luck to you.

[Deleted]

The upside of being ranged is that you can keep a good view of the raid... The downside of being a dps is that if you are to perform well, you need to focus on your buttons, not on what other people are doing.

I haven't been keeping up on elemental shaman MoP, but if it becomes an easy rotation; awesome.

Warlock raid leading as shadowbolt spamming spec in TBC was the way to go.

[Zhalfirin]

I think dps have the least to worry about actually, esp as a ranged dps. I RL as a hunter and I can do my rotation pretty mindlessly so I can actually call out most of the stuff, it also helps to only have rapid fire as a castable cooldown lol. I also rank on many fights too so its not like im slacking on dps to RL

[cyqu]

Hello guys out there,

I am a raid leader of a 10 man guild and recently I swapped my main to elemental shaman. Been tanking for years and I just felt I need a change. I really enjoy dps role atm, however, I cannot focus on raid leading like I could when I was tanking. So far I did 2 raids as dps, do you think it is just matter of time until I get used to play the class and role and then I would be able to lead raid like before?

Are there any ppl who lead raids as a dps? In every guild I've been over years, raid leader was a tank..

Post your opinions

Thanks a lot.

i raid lead as a shadow priest, and i had only been playing shadow maybe a month when we were start DS progression it was hella annoying watching dot timer + raid timers + everyone else, just be happy you get to press LB over and over again, but like most have said its a matter of getting comfortable with it. Raiding leading will always effect your performance in one way or another its a matter of how little you let it.