Top DPS Openers by class for FFXIV

Alrighty folks,
After yet another night of dummy parsing, I realized that I have a stack of bookmarks for openers for different classes, and each is formatted differently. It's made it kind of a pain when I go back to a class I haven't touched in a while so I decided to do a consolidated post here for both quick reference and community involvement.

This post is completely open for questions, suggestions, criticisms, and links. If you know of or use a different one than the listed, I'm happy to add it to the list.

Listed stat priorities thanks to Dervy and his WordPress Pages on Stat Weights & Theorycrafting

-------------- Tanks (An * indicates an off-GCD weave-in) --------------

Warrior (Weapon Damage > Strength > Accuracy to cap > Skill Speed to at least 480 > Critical Hit Rate > Determination)

Warrior Generic DPS Opener #1 - Truff's typical. Used when DPSing as OT and sacrifices a bit of potency in order to guarantee 100% up time on both debuffs as well as mitigate threat levels. A Butcher's Block combo can be exchanged instead of Storm's Path for better DPS and more Threat as the situation allows.
Ref: "3.0 WAR Opener Discussion"

http://i.imgur.com/AdlydCv.png
Link: http://ffxivrotations.com/1yg
Heavy Swing > *Brutal Swing > Maim > Storm's Eye > Heavy Swing > Maim > *Internal Release > Storm's Path > Strength Pot
Heavy Swing > *Berserk > Fell Cleave > *Infuriate > Fell Cleave > *Brutal Swing > Skill Sunder > *Vengeance > Butcher's Block >
*Raw Intuition > Heavy Swing > Maim > Fell Cleave > Storm's Eye > Fracture > ((Pacified from losing Berserk)) *Brutal Swing


A3S/4S Burst Opener - Used to get your defensive CDs available again early in a fight or to push as much damage as possible before a jump/ invulnerable/ etc. -Thanks Kitty!

http://i.imgur.com/t8XpbZg.png
Link: http://ffxivrotations.com/1yj
*Vengeance & *Raw Intuition > Heavy Swing > *Internal Release > Maim > *Berserk & *Brutal Swing > Storm's Eye > *STR Pot >
Fell Cleave > *Infuriate > Fell Cleave > etc


Kitty's Pure-Burst-For-Solo-Gold-Hunts opener. Also usable in Defiance with the appropriate skills

http://i.imgur.com/a1sW6fv.png
Link: http://ffxivrotations.com/1yj
*Vengeance & *Raw Intuition > Heavy Swing > *Brutal Swing & *Internal Release > Main > *Berserk > Storm's Eye > *STR Potion >
Fell Cleave > *Infuriate > Fell Cleave > Fracture > Heavy Swing > Skill Sunder > Butcher's Block > *Brutal Swing > Heavy Swing >
Maim



Paladin (WD > STR > Acc to cap > Crit > Det > SS)

Paladin Opener #1



Dark Knight (Coming Soon?)

Dark Knight Opener #1



-------------- Caster DPS (An * indicates an off-GCD weave-in) --------------

Summoner (WD > Int > Acc to cap > Crit > Det > SS)
Ref: "The 3.0 Summoner: An Extensive Guide"

Summoner Opener #1 "Sleigh's Opener" - I use this one as my primary opener. The DPS is great but the timings are really tight, especially with the constant double off-GCD ability use between Ruin IIs. It took me some serious practice time on the dummy to get it right and as soon as I stepped away from SMN for a few weeks, I couldn't consistently pull it off anymore.
**You can precast Shadow Flare when possible** Start your Bio II cast at 3 seconds before the pull

http://i.imgur.com/FEFsYAT.png
Link: http://ffxivrotations.com/1yk
Bio II > Miasma > Bio I > *Swiftcast & *Fester > *Shadow Flare > *Rouse & *Spur >
Ruin II > *Int Potion > Ruin II > *Raging Strikes & *Painflare > Ruin II > *Fester & *Dreadwyrm Trance >
Ruin II > *Aetherflow & *Enkindle > Ruin II > Tri-Disaster > Ruin III (& Contagion w/ Garuda)
Ruin II > *Fester > Ruin III > Ruin II > *Deathflare > Ruin > Ruin > Shadow Flare

Refresh DoTs with < 3 seconds left ticking, Ruin II into *Fester & *Rouse on cool down until Aetherflow is up again

http://i.imgur.com/g6qvKiH.png
Ruin II > *Aetherflow & *Dreadwyrm > Ruin III > *Fester > Ruin III > Ruin III > *Swiftcast > Ruin III >
*Tri-Disaster (Contagion) > Ruin II > *Fester & *Deathflare


Summoner Opener #2 - Ecastle's Custom (TM) - Has more ramp up and less early burst than Sleigh's, but stacks more buffs onto the mid-opener heavy hitters.

http://i.imgur.com/CMzXNMY.png
Link: http://ffxivrotations.com/1xh
Shadow Flare > Bio II > Miasma > Bio > *Fester > Ruin > Ruin > Ruin II > *Rouse &
*Spur > Ruin II > *Fester > Ruin > Ruin II > *Raging Strikes & *Painflare & *Aetherflow > Ruin II >
*Dreadwyrm > *INT Potion & *Tri-Disaster > Ruin II > *Enkindle & *Fester > Ruin II > *Swiftcast & *Contagion >
Shadow Flare > Ruin III > Ruin II > *Fester & *Deathflare



Black Mage (WD > Int > Acc to cap > SS > Crit >=< Det) [Need a good reference for BLM weights. Finding conflicting info even though all agree on SS]

Black Mage Opener #1 Absolutely beastly single target opener with rock solid burst. After comparing multiple openers we found this one to be superior. - Thanks Loxain!
Ref: "FFXIV Heavensward: Black Mage Opener/ Rotation "Guide" (3.07)"

http://i.imgur.com/72X87y9.png
Link: http://ffxivrotations.com/1yl
Time -9: *Sharpcast
Time -3: *Quelling Strikes > Fire > *Enochian > Fire III > *Ley Lines & *Raging Strikes > Fire IV > Int Pot >
Fire > Fire IV > Fire IV > Fire IV >

http://i.imgur.com/m1R2xnw.png
(With Firestarter Proc) Link: http://ffxivrotations.com/1ym
Fire III > *Convert & *Swiftcast > Fire IV > Fire IV > Blizzard III > Thunder > Blizzard

http://i.imgur.com/3iAosts.png
(Without Firestarter Proc) Link: http://ffxivrotations.com/1yn
*Swiftcast > Flare > *Convert > Fire IV > Blizzard III > Thunder II > Blizzard IV

Black Mage Standard AoE Rotation

http://i.imgur.com/7o1rhzS.png
Link: http://ffxivrotations.com/2b0
*Ley Lines > Fire III > *Quelling Strikes & *Raging Strikes > Fire II > Fire II > Fire II > Flare > *Convert &
*Swiftcast > Flare > *Transpose > Thunder II > Fire III > Rinse and repeat



-------------- Ranged DPS (An * indicates an off-GCD weave-in) --------------

Bard (WD > Dex > Acc to cap > Crit > Det > SS)

Bard Opener #1 Potentially Better Bard Opener?



Machinist (Coming Soon?)

Machinist Opener #1



-------------- Melee DPS (An * indicates an off-GCD weave-in) --------------

Dragoon (WD > STR > Acc to cap > Crit > Det > SS to at least 590)
Ref: "How to Dragoon per Second: A DPS Paradigm"

Dragoon Opener #1
Ref: "FFXIV: HW - 3.0 Advanced Dragoon Rotation Guide & Tips" - Thanks Athoen!

http://i.imgur.com/smkAMAY.jpg
Link: http://ffxivrotations.com/1y5
Heavy Thrust > *Battle Litany & *Blood for Blood > Impulse Drive > *Internal Release & *Blood of the Dragon > Disembowel > *STR Pot > Chaos Thrust >
*Power Surge & *Leg Sweep > Wheeling Thrust > *Jump > Phlebotomize > *Dragonfire Dive > True Thrust > *Spineshatter Dive > Vorpal Thrust >
*Life Surge & *Geirskogul > Full Thrust > Fang And Claw



Monk (WD > STR > Acc to cap > Crit > Det > SS)
Refs: Unnamed Spreadsheet, "Monk 3.0 CHAKRA UNLEASHED" -Thanks Bigcedric

Monk Opener #1 - The Morbid Coffee Custom (TM)

http://i.imgur.com/5ImJpLN.png
Link: http://ffxivrotations.com/1sm
Demolish > *Perfect Balance > Snap Punch > Snap Punch > *Blood For Blood > Dragon Kick > *Internal Release > Twin Snakes > *STR Pot > Snap Punch >
*Elixir Field > Touch of Death > *Steel Peak > Bootshine > *Howling Fist > True Strike > *Forbidden Chakra > Demolish > Dragon Kick > Twin Snakes > Fracture

Quote:

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Patch 3.07 openers

Ossom's
Snap > PB > Snap > Demo > Dragon Kick > Twin > B4B > Snap > IR > ToD > XPOT > Boot > Elixer > True > Howling > Snap > Steel Peak > Dragon > Shoulder Tackle > Twin > Forbidden > Demo > Bootshine.

Lilyth's
(PB) Demo --> Snap --> Snap (B4B) --> DK (IR) --> TwS (Pot) --> ToD (Elixir Field) --> Boot (Steel Peak) --> True (Howling Fist) --> Snap --> (Forbidden C) --> DK --> TWS --> Demo (Pot falls off).

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Ninja (WD > Dex > Acc to cap > Crit > Det > SS)
Ref: "Shasta's Ninja Guide" -Thanks Nemu!

Ninja Opener #1 - Shasta's (From the Guild Death And Taxes) "With Potion" opener. Best used in longer-duration fights as it sacrifices some early burst for a higher overall throughput.

http://i.imgur.com/IBRdMtR.png
Link: http://ffxivrotations.com/1mk
Huton > (wait 20s) > Suiton > Spinning Edge > Kassatsu & Internal Release > Gust Slash > DEX Potion > Dancing Edge > Blood for Blood >
Spinning Edge > Trick Attack > Shadow Fang > Raiton > Mutilate > Dream within a Dream > Spinning Edge > Mug > Gust Slash >
Duality > Aeolian Edge > Jugulate



-------------- Healers (An * indicates an off-GCD weave-in) --------------

Astrologian (Coming Soon?)

Astrologian Opener #1



Scholar (Coming Soon?)

Scholar Opener #1
Ref: McNutty
Pre Cast Shadowflare - Hit the boss before the tank - Ignore tank getting mad that you pulled without warning - Bio 2 - Miasma - Bio - Energy Drain x 3 - Ignore white mage getting angry they have to solo heal - Kill Fairy after the next 3 Energy drains for a total of 9 - Broil like your life depended on it - pat self on back for climbing up on the DPS charts while everyone else is dead.



White Mage (Coming Soon?)

White Mage Opener #1 - Myz's DPS Opener (Tank deaths are the fairy's fault)

http://i.imgur.com/zPLEItO.png
Link: http://ffxivrotations.com/2b2
Presence of Mind > INT Potion > Aero III > Aero > Fluid Aura > Aero II > 3-4x Stone III
Save panicking tank with Divine Seal > Tetragrammaton > Regen


- - - Updated - - -

More to come. Decided to post it in progress.

The rabbit hole was much, much deeper than I expected!

http://dtguilds.com/forum/m/6563292/...as-ninja-guide


This is a pretty good reference for the Ninja side of things I found today. Tried using this opener with great success. The guide has a ton of other great info too for NIN.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by NemuNeko

http://dtguilds.com/forum/m/6563292/...as-ninja-guide


This is a pretty good reference for the Ninja side of things I found today. Tried using this opener with great success. The guide has a ton of other great info too for NIN.

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Thanks Nemu! I've incorporated the link under the Ninja section for now and will get it all typed into the main post soon.

The Scholar one could be classified as:

Pre Cast Shadowflare - Hit the boss before the tank - Ignore tank getting mad that you pulled without warning - Bio 2 - Miasma - Bio - Energy Drain x 3 - Ignore white mage getting angry they have to solo heal - Kill Fairy after the next 3 Energy drains for a total of 9 - Broil like your life depended on it - pat self on back for climbing up on the DPS charts while everyone else is dead.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by McNutty

The Scholar one could be classified as:

Pre Cast Shadowflare - Hit the boss before the tank - Ignore tank getting mad that you pulled without warning - Bio 2 - Miasma - Bio - Energy Drain x 3 - Ignore white mage getting angry they have to solo heal - Kill Fairy after the next 3 Energy drains for a total of 9 - Broil like your life depended on it - pat self on back for climbing up on the DPS charts while everyone else is dead.

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I honestly never, even once, thought of saccing the fairy to get in 3 more EDs. That's brilliant. I'm going to tell Nemu (Our SCH) and Eilri (Our WHM) is going to hate you McNutty. Great job!

Are we talking about raid dps or target dummy dps? In raid extra modifiers include party buff timing (battle litany, foes ect) and mechanic duties that can clip into a rotation. Target dummy is unhindered but the parses online often include potions and a full party of buff timing tailored to the player's liking (which is why none of us can usually match them).

For WAR OT:

A1S - No mechanics until split, can do any opening. Xeno's 3 fell cleave opener is reddit's favourite, but pre-pop is also used (see A3s).

A2S - Initial target will live maybe 4 gcds, then it's packs of mobs so 3 fell cleave opener is discarded and we overpower spam for days.

A3S - Many groups use battle litany ect immediately here, so putting off berserk means one can lose half the party buffs. Alternate opener seen has the bard play paeon, which lasts the warrior 3ish gcds before it falls off. WAR loads the vengeance and raw int stacks before pull, then it's heavy swing-internal release-maim-berserk-eye-pot and 2 fell cleaves (brutal pushed in first 3 gcds, where convenient), but no pacify so we merrily keep swinging away. Here's a kill video of one. Vengence & raw int come up much sooner in the fight this way and can be used for another free 2 stacks.

A4S - I've seen it done several ways with similar dps results, but often the WAR takes 1st leg. The opener will again change whether you have a ninja to direct threat or not, and if path (lower dps) is used because the ninja has eye up, or WAR says screw it omgdps and overwrites it cause it hits harder. WAR instead as OT has to pre-pop vengeance 8 seconds before pull if they want it up 1-2 sec before combined carnage and hydro missile so they can avoid stance dancing and just go balls out deliverance... so the pre-pop opener from A3S here is slightly less than 3 fell cleave opener but makes up during 2nd leg. Who gets sucked into quarantine with the tank will also utterly randomize some things that get popped (BLM pulled at shitty time in their rotation might mean an extra stack so equilib can't be used to cover sprinting back to manipulator ect).

As final note, skill speed stacking depends on latency. Upwards beyond 500 is needed for 3 fell cleave opener if you're looking at 80+ ms, and no buttons can be macroed to mercy stroke ect because it eliminates ability queuing. If you have any packet loss the pre-pop method is favoured for being nearly the same dps in most situations without the risk of latency, enabling skill speed to be replaced with crit on gear and flexibility on having vengence & raw int come up sooner for emergencies. But yes on paper 3-fell cleave opener is technically highest dps.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by McNutty

The Scholar one could be classified as:

Pre Cast Shadowflare - Hit the boss before the tank - Ignore tank getting mad that you pulled without warning - Bio 2 - Miasma - Bio - Energy Drain x 3 - Ignore white mage getting angry they have to solo heal - Kill Fairy after the next 3 Energy drains for a total of 9 - Broil like your life depended on it - pat self on back for climbing up on the DPS charts while everyone else is dead.

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You need to factor in the 10% chance that you forgot to summon your fairy before the pull.

Thanks Kitty! The notes for A3S and A4S will come in handy for me soon I hope.

I considered putting an entry with the openers listing where they are best used, but decided instead for outliers like A2S to leave it to the judement of the player. By the 2nd or 3rd time you pull A2S it should be pretty obvious that the goblins die long before being worth wasting Zerk and combo points. I usually build to 5 and Decimate into the crowd for the first couple of waves and save Berserk, Unchained, and double-Decimate on wave 3.

As for Skill Speed stacking I listed the "At least 480" since that matches up with my reference material, but I personally split away from what the net considers optimal and stack SS over pretty much anything else. I'm sitting at 678 right now, well above the soft cap, but I find that I really like the flexibility it gives me for tight timers that a lot of fights use. A great example is Thordan Ex: I can squeeze in an extra Fell Cleave just as he walks away at the end of first phase. When I ran the suggested amount I was never able to get that last hit in without jumping ahead of the pull timer. An extra 500 potency attack makes up for more crit or det than my feeble math skills can figure out, but I'm sure I come out ahead.

I absolutely LOVE theory craft and improving my play. If you ever want to crunch numbers or run some comparison parses, I'm always around and willing.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Trufflepig

I honestly never, even once, thought of saccing the fairy to get in 3 more EDs. That's brilliant. I'm going to tell Nemu (Our SCH) and Eilri (Our WHM) is going to hate you McNutty. Great job!

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I've done many terrible things in my life. Killing Selene in the first 5 minutes of a fight in order to get a few thousand more extra damage is just one of them.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Trufflepig

I absolutely LOVE theory craft and improving my play. If you ever want to crunch numbers or run some comparison parses, I'm always around and willing.

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Ahh I'm not much help I have a high rate of packet loss and 100ms so I can't execute the on-paper stuff usually. I'm at the end of dsl/phone service in the middle of nowhere, in the farthest tucked away corner of the country from the server. Like on A3s on hands we pull to edge, then I pull to middle 2 & 2/3rds gcds in because if I wait for the hand to glow the combination of my lag and random packet loss would kill us. Can't be 2 gcds, can't be 4. Castbars start 2/5th to half full for me. The group that does the video I linked is in Australia and they down stuff pretty quick. They deal with a similar ping & loss so I've often checked out what they're up to and I glean some strats from sections I get stumped on.

Anyways yuh my exact rotations are not useful for normal people with intertubes not made out of sticks and berries so I've excluded them. I do the pre-pop with some alterations based on mechanics. On average I stance swap way more than other people because I rely on inner beast to make up for shitty internets.

P.S. Don't move to the middle of nowhere

P.S.S. It will make you a bitter old husk when you watch people with normal internet get hit by mechanics YOU HAD A WHOLE CASTBAR TO RUN AWAY and then you need another beer

DRG - https://youtu.be/WIVZJyt4LMI

Warning - This rotation adds a number of complexities with priorities and on the fly decisions. Especially on bosses where you aren't going to be perfect. Don't go insane trying to replicate but glean the tips from it. Do not lose sleep if you can't do this rotation perfectly. Learn to be flexible to maximize DPS on individual boss abilities, invuln periods, etc.

To put it into the fancy tool that Morbid has...
http://ffxivrotations.com/1y5

http://i.imgur.com/smkAMAY.jpg

Obviously that could be slightly different depending on what 4th ability actually procs for you!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Athoen

..Especially on bosses where you aren't going to be perfect.

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Filthy casual! Get out of my Expert Dungeon!

Ossom's opener is what you would do as a monk if you're entire playstyle involves smashing your face on the keyboard and hoping you're doing DPS. It will fuck you over as the fight progresses because almost nothing lines up. Lilyth's opener is slightly closer to the right one, but I disagree with using FC after demolish because you run the risk of dropping the DK buff.

This is the opener I generally use (but be warned, this opener only works for children and elitists!):
http://i.imgur.com/5ImJpLN.png
Link: http://ffxivrotations.com/1sm

Why is this opener better?

• Delaying B4B and IR once in your PB cycle will let both buffs last for a majority of your second rotation leading into the end of the opener.
• Moving every GCD up from Steel peak onward before the second demolish lines your skills up more neatly, and allows you to get the full damage out of Forbidden Chakara.
• You get a B4B and potion buffed fracture, which increases your overall DPS in the end. While most people will bitch and moan that "omg fracture is a waste of tp," and it is, the very same people think also think the proper use of fracture is to spam the shit out of it then complain on reddit how bad a skill it is. DO NOT SPAM FRACTURE. Hell, at most you may only get to use it two or three times a fight (or 4-5 on fights like A1S and Ravana EX with a ton of downtime). You can't go ham with fracture without a ninja feeding you goad, and if you do you might as well rename yourself to Xeno. But moderate and proper use = more overall dps.

My SMN rotation is slightly different from all the listed SMN rotations I've seen online but I mine is better I feel, it just has a bit of ramp up time. It's essentially a modified 2F/1P.

http://i.imgur.com/PTStyXH.png

The Shadowflare at the start is precasted meaning it's already on the floor before pull. As the tank is about to run in you want to time Bio II to land the second the tank makes contact with the boss. The reason being is that Bio II has no initial damage so you won't pull threat anyway and you want your dots to start ticking as fast as possible. After the first Bio always remember to wait like 1 second before hitting Fester or else you lose out on 100 potency because Bio hasn't "landed" yet and you miss out on the extra potency Bio being on the target gives to Fester.

After that I have Rouse and Spur at that particular spot in my rotation for a reason. They fall off just after Garuda will cast Aerial Blast (Enkindle) meaning that she doesn't waste a boosted damage pet GCD on the Contagion right after. Also using a potion before Enkindle boosts Garuda's attack even further as she gets the benefit of potions as well. There have been times when Garuda has the biggest hit in the opener (and sometimes bigger than anybody else in your party as well) if you have unfortunate crit luck.

Ruin II is used a lot in the opener to weave in off GCDs. So that's why you see it so frequently. The location of Raging Strikes and potion are also important because they both fall off right after you use Deathflare.

This entire rotation was devised by trying to get a hyper-boosted Deathflare and working backwards from there to get as much DPS from everything else. As you can see you get 2 Dreadwyrm Trance+Raging Strikes+Potion boosted Festers as well as a set of dots with those same buffs that are Contagion'd (15 seconds added to each dot) squeezed in there before your super Deathflare (which has been know to hit upwards of 10k from time to time on crits).

Having a bard will help as well so you can get Foe Requiem which really makes these numbers ridiculous. Kayko generally starts with Foe precasted so everything is 10% buffed at the start and then at about the time I use Raging Strikes ( a little earlier actually closer to the 2nd Fester I think) he uses Battle Voice to bump that 10% to 20% which then lasts all the way through your Dreadwyrm Trance. By the time that opener ends its like maybe 45 seconds into the fight but your DPS will be at it's highest. Since this rotation takes so long it isn't ideal in many fights where the boss transitions before that point. This is more for use in a raid setting where the bosses stay in their opening form for long periods of time.

One last thing to note. You want to use your 3rd Aetherflow stack on Fester after you reapply Bio after the contagion'd Bio falls off. The reason for this is that it pushes your Aethertrail Attunement stacks back to a 30 second countdown which means you will be able to use Aetherflow and Dreadwyrm Trance at the same time so you can get 2 10% buffed (from the passive 10% damage boost of Dreadwyrm Trance) Festers inside that 15 second window generally you would use Tri-Disaster and Contagion here again as well to get the buffed extended dots too. From there you just repeat the 3rd fester timing so you always can use 2 stacks during Dreadwyrm Trance.

Thanks Ecastle! That one really is a bit different than the one I'm used to.
I've gotta crash out, but I'm going to do some more work on this post tomorrow afternoon and will get your and Morbid's posts incorporated all in one chunk.

This is really receiving a lot more feedback than I expected.
Thanks everyone!

Kitty OT Lag-Immune Pre-Pop - Vengence & Raw Int (generally 10 sec before pull, Justy announces he's going), and I do the off gcds in this order. Brutal Swing & Internal Release can be combined before the gcd ticks over. If I get pacified the very next ability is Storm's Eye and my maim is still active so unbuffed downtime is minimized. If I have Paeon, no pacify so I just carry on. Even with shitty internet this will always work with great burst. If I am with an undergeared MT I will swap the Butcher's for Storm's Path, because being so front loaded it's an enormous load of threat and will pull hate otherwise.

I also use this in Defiance mode on hunts, because it will net gold participation solo and I often take lead on threat. Fell Cleaves just become Inner Beasts and I skip Fracture & Pot, so Storm's Eye lands just before pacify but doesn't matter because the thing is gangbeaten dead within moments. If you see a WAR take a solid threat lead they are using either this or something almost the same.

http://i.imgur.com/1ogqMGm.png

As the most cleric stancy whm in flight 1, I would say an ideal opening would be this given that nothing misses :(
CS -> PoM - > Int Pot -> A3 -> A1 -> FA -> A2 -> 3-4x Stone III's depending on tank's hp usually 10% (if tank dies blame Selene)
Then you would use DS -> Tetra -> Regen -> (maybe Asylum if it will be up when you need it) -> CS -> refresh dots

Updated to include most of the first page entries and convert a lot of the text to FFXIVrotations.com images. More to come so keep those inputs flowing!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Trufflepig

http://i.imgur.com/AdlydCv.png

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Storm's Path is not needed in current raid content except for:

- some tank busters, as inner beast + a c/d handles most just fine
- high dmg group attack
- short duration burst incoming damage
- really undergeared for the content, literally the bare minimum to be let in the door
- your healer is mad, stoned, disconnecting or all three
- panic time

Butchers is the highest damage of the three combo finishers (250/270/280) and the 10% damage reduction will go nearly unnoticed during lack of incoming damage at beginning of all four current encounters. I only use Path for:

A2s final 2 widows - gokart putting stacks on both tanks, so the incoming damage spikes. I used to need it for the jagds too, now I just inner beast the swipes.
A3s cascade - during progression our SMN and WHM had lowest healthpool and could die by a few dozen HP, even thru adlo, virus and divine veil. I don't actually need to use it here anymore but it still provides a backup in case the other mitigation is accidentally dropped.
A3s group shared slap - someone may die otherwise. Applied twice for this over the encounter.
A3s twin hands - I put one up, and blow all my cooldowns in sequence so I can go ham (this does leave nothing for tethers, so I inner beast both).
A3s hand snatch - one healer is stunlocked and I'm getting slapcleaved
A4s mortal revolution - one of the few things that actually helps, and it hits super hard coming into 4th leg. I don't have time to use it anywhere else due the absurd group damage output reqs

Oh and one weird special case, a few weeks back someone didn't pull final phase 1st digitisis off me so I got stuck with the tank debuff. I couldn't take boss or I'd utterly explode, so Justy had to eat more stacks than usual until I could provoke safely. I did keep Path up 100% for that and combined with some other raid efforts we still beat it fine.

A3&4 have brutal dps reqs, and most groups beat their first A3s as the group is getting wiped to final enrage cascade. Every little drip of dps matters :3

Thanks again man. I wouldn't have expected 30 potency to be that big of a deal, though I can see it adding up. I've gotten into the habit of just alternating Eye and Path to make the rest of the group's life easier (Less aggro generation and a hand to the healers for AoE. Figured it would let the Sch DPS for longer by taking the edge off of the WHM) but I can see how that is a bad habit to fall into.

To be honest I didn't think that it would be *that* tight considering we'll be heading into the content with a raid item level of rough 203-205 instead of 185ish. Really that bad in there eh?

Yeah it's awful. Even now when you watch Xeno or other groups with it on farm for months, it's pretty common to witness several wipes before a clear. 1% of the playerbase has cleared A3s and a fraction of that has beaten A4s. Here is a recent parse of ours. It's a horribly designed fight, I'm doing 900ish tank dps and the thing still dies a few attacks shy of enrage. It's an 11 minute nonstop barrage of one shot mechanics and everyone has to know how to move, when and exactly where or they will murder the raid... except you can't trust the screen because of the inherent lag. So you have to memorize all the reaction & movement of everyone else, go to your spot and not derp your rotation anywhere or we all die.

When you finally get all the mechanics down the real killer is finger pointing because you're 15% short when enrage hits. So then it's combing over and over and over and optimizing, painfully scraping dps out of holes you didn't know you had. 10 dps here, 5 there (I too used storms' path liberally, then had to progressively trim it off). To put it in perspective we never even encountered an enrage on any other boss T1-T13, hell we usually skipped phases accidentally while learning. It's such a bizarre massive jump from A2s to A3s in dps reqs, it's not a gradient it's a massive cliff made out of the dried up tears of thousands of shattered statics. So many just hit the point where they can't improve, brickwall headsmash it for weeks then turn on each other or burnout quit.

Then you get to do it all over again in A4s, which has an even higher dps requirement... but luckily less movement. I think 4 is not more difficult but after 3 it's just too big a mouthful and time commitment for most of us, so the clear rate is microscopic.

Yoshi has addressed this because the raiding community collapsed on the smaller servers as people migrated to the few bigger ones, yet the clear rate is still faaaar below expected. It's not like ffxiv is full of potato-brains either, a lot of of people have old heroic wow (now mythic) raid clear exp.

tl;dr 30 potency difference is peas and carrots til A3s, then you have to channel your inner tax collector

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Originally Posted by Neko

Here is a recent parse of ours.

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That one is actually a decently fast kill the fight has a 13 minute enrage so we came in under by a minute and 20 seconds. We did like 6600 DPS on that kill when you really only need 6100 group DPS but yeah still stupid high. We were struggling even in 203+ gear for a while. A4S is just as bad you need like 6700 DPS over I think 15 minutes I forget when enrage is. Needless to say they are fights you probably aren't overgearing for a while.

That is nuts. Can't wait to check the place out. I haven't really been into a fight that pushes a really hard DPS check since Vaelstrahz back in Black Wing Lair.

Thanks for all of the inputs. Now that I'm back from my short visit to Diablo III, I've gotten them all plugged into the first page.

Except for Nemu's link to the Ninja page. I haven't gone and read that yet since I don't play one. I'll get to it soon.

This is the dragoon rotation I use...I don't know if it's the best but it works well and appears to be better lined up than the one you posted!

http://i.imgur.com/p0CQEfA.png

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Eilri

This is the dragoon rotation I use...I don't know if it's the best but it works well and appears to be better lined up than the one you posted!

http://i.imgur.com/p0CQEfA.png

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Look at the "With Potion" rotation. It is identical except the person in your link is switching Blood for Blood with Internal Release. IR should be second because it is a 15s buff whereas B4B is 20s. Popping IR first will result in having one or two GCD and two OGCD attacks not being buffed by both B4B and IR at the same time near the end of the opener when you're hitting Thrusts and Dragonfire, Spineshatter, and depending on SS your Geirskogul.

Nice! I was actually planning to go looking on reddit later to find that same image. I've seen it and similar before and think they're really useful for quick references. I'd never have noticed the B4B vs Internal Release disparity either, but that's exactly the sort of thing I was hoping to find & address in this post. Such a small swap to the common opener, but definitely squeezes out some extra juice.

At the moment I have a pretty big blind spot when it comes to all of the melee DPS classes. The only one I have at cap is Warrior and every time I go back to work on Dragoon, Monk, or Ninja I end up hating the DPS queues and missing Fell Cleave.

I noticed there is none for MCH. Seing as nobody ever publishes anything about how to MCH, I thought I would link my opener. Many hours have been spent working out, tweaking and testing this wildfire opener both by myself and talking with some other good MCH players (Yes, there are a few of us!) If anybody ever wants help getting to learn MCH and wants some help with it, hit me up in-game (Ayuna Arulat) I'm always willing to teach :)

MY MCH OPENER: http://ffxivrotations.com/3zj
(Also pretty much what you do whenever wildfire comes back off cool-down, give or take a few buffs that may or may not be up at that time.)