Sqeezing the most DPS from your Pally

[Linc]

Evening all,

As my guild started to make there way in to Solteris all of the classes where asked to have a look at ways to maximise there dps for the events like 1+2 and I took a stab at writing something down. I thought I would post it up here in the hope it helps a few fellow pallies and if you have anything to add then please post below and I will do my best to incorporate it in to the main body.
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A Paladin's guide to DPS
Paladin dps on live mobs is poor and there is no real way to address this but in an effort for us to put our "best foot forwards" these are the steps that you can take to maximise your dps on live mobs.

Maximise your AA to increase DPS
The following AA will all have a positive (but small) impact on your to total dps but the cumulative effect from having them all maxed is not to be underestimated.

(Format = Name, Level, Expansion, Levels, Cost, Effect)
Burst of Power 80 SoF 5 8/? Increases triple attack chance

Combat Fury 64 SoL (1-3), PoP (4-6) 6 2/4/6 , 3/ increase chance to crit hit

Double Riposte 64 SoL (1-3), PoP (4-6) 6 03/06/08 Increase chance to riposte twice (only helps dps if tanking)

Enhanced Aggression 59 (1-5), 75 (6-10), 80 (11-15) DoD (1-5), TSS (6-10), SoF (11-15) 15 5/, 7/ Increased worn attack cap (5 / level)

Veteran's Wrath 69 (1-3), 75 (4-6), 80 (7-9); CF3 OoW (1-3), TSS (4-6), SoF (7-9) 9 3/6/9, 3/6/9, 7/ increased chance to crit on melee hits

Weapons Affinity 55 GoD 5 05/06/08 increased weapon procs

2h Bash 59 SoL 1 6 Allows bash while using 2h weapon

Knight's Advantage 65 (1-3), 75 (4-6) PoP (1-3), TSS (4-6) 3 2/4/6, 5/ Increased chance to double attack w/ 2h weapon

Knight's Expertise 70, KA3 DoD 3 07/06/08 More increased chance to double attack with 2h weapon

Knight's Return Strike 79 SoF 3 03/06/09 Gives chance to bash upon riposte (only helps dps if tanking)

Speed of the Knight 65 (1-3), 70 (4-6), 75 (7-9), 80 (10-12) PoP (1-3), DoD (4-6), TSS (7-9), SoF (10-12) 12 2/4/6, ?, ?, 7/ Extra chance to hit with 2h weapons

Maximise your Equipment
Attack Maximum worn attack cap with maxed aa is 400, try to get as close to this cap as possible when planning your equipment upgrades

Accuracy this allows you to hit more often and miss less with any given number of swings, the more of this the better and its has a worn cap of 150 look for this stat when you plan gear upgrades.

Combat Effects These allow you to proc more times on average per minute with the any weapon that you wield, the base number of procs is 2 per minute with 100 worn Combat Effects this increases to 3/minute, its worn cap is 100.

Haste allows you to swing your weapon faster and this generates more hits and misses increasing your overall dps on all mob types the higher your worn haste the better, best worn haste is 46%

General Advice
Where possible hit the mob in the back, this means that the mob cannot parry, block or dodge the attack and means you hit more often. The only time to not hit the mob in the back is when the Raid Leader calls for a mob to be positioned or balanced in which case we move to whatever side of the mob is required.

We have very few discs and they have a very long refresh but Holyforge does help to creep up our DPS even on live mobs it increases our Crit rate and lets us Cripple mobs, use this when a DPS burn is called for.

Veteran AA's There is a 7th year vet aa ability called Intensity of the Resolute it lasts for 1min and has 4hr reuse timer (god I hate SOE) but while this is running crit rates are increased and hits are all harder even spells and heals crit for more AND more often, use this if possible when burn is called for - if you can run this while Holyforge is running the two stack excellently Very Happy

If you have some spare AA then purchase a Glyph of Destruction these cost 3aa and they increase your melee and spell crit rate by 50% for there 2 minute duration, they have a 10 minute resuse timer. You can also try purchasing Glyph of Courage, this increases damage dealt by you but i do not have an exact value for this Glyph (anyone got details please post below).

There is Tribute effect that you can purchase called "Fury of Combat" and this has a percentage chance of adding an additional attack to each round of attack, it is not spectacular and costs quite a lot to run but it all helps. If you this triggers on a round where you triple atack then you quad attack and get a message like "You hit with a Flurry of Attacks" which is very cool to see, its also possible to quad slay in one round (though damn rare)

Nearly all paladins do more dps with there 2h weapon and aa's than with there 1h unless there 1h is vastly better ratio and I do not think this is the case with any of us so please please please make sure your 2h is equipped for dps roles. If you have the aa 2h bash then do not forget to mash the button every time it lights up it can add between 30/50dps to your total output and if all four pallies are doing this it can really help.

Have fun, I am sure that a lot has been missed but this is an attempt at a full answer for Pally dps, any thoughts please post below.

Linc

[Brohg]

Vet's Wrath increases the size of crits when they happen, doesn't boost crit rate.

Your equipment section should "probably" mention Ferocity and Cleave foci.

There's a dps tribute that stacks with those, provides chance to Flurry.

A section on buffs might be appropriate. Most dps buffs can be clicked off without a thought when in the normal role of tanking or CCing, they should be sought out when appropriate.

[kolor]

for dps events like sisters in solteris, i use ranger poison instead of brells/sot
also use an overhaste clicky - 8% overhaste is fairly easy to come by

[varutia]

Selection of weapon also plays a big factor in dps, low delay good ratio 2 hander generally is the best. Strike through also makes big dps difference when you hitting from side in a lot of cases.

The buffs you have also will make a lot of difference, various of plus attack, increase crit chance, proc etc etc will contribute to the dps increase as well.

[Brohg]

Yeah, shadowknights have to look exclusively for slower 2h, 35+ dly, but paladins should be seeking the same dps weapons as berserkers & warriors. The fastest 2h in your tier of content. For SoF that's piercers.

[Hulkling]

[Brohg]

Consult the cast times of your nukes/stuns. Shadowknights' spells, after hybrid haste, are still 1.5sec to cast. That means they need a 35 or 36 delay weapon to even try threading swings. It's doable, I know a couple who accomplish it regularly, but it's hard. Paladin spells - stuns and Benediction - are 0.5sec. If you can't thread swings with 0.5 sec spells on even the fastest of 2h, you're not even trying.

[knytul]

umm...were pallys....who cares?

[Hulkling]

[dindaur]

tunare is also 3 second cast

[Normy]

[kruelcon]

for one on a full burn like in soltaris a paly is not tanking and were not realy dps BUT brohg is right on the dps point why are you casting stuns or any other spell for that matter on a live mob or even useing a undead nuke on a undead mob( unless last rites) that is .5 and can easly be timed in with 30 delay weapon( or your not trying at all ) when you will over ride the bard fd and loose raid dps if you use benediction or burial rites? and in my experience when im tanking im not dpsing unless in group form. then our dps is so sad unless undead to be honest 1400-1800 dps on live mobs(not in dps group) is sad and the faster weapon would probably be worth it for burn mobs and the (sk type )34 + for offtanking dpsing and group instances where stun + challenge is used lots. but for max dps yes the faster delay are way better for our class cause we have nothing to cast while we are dpsing and not oftanking except 1 undead nuke in raid situation and that can be timed with the fast delay weapon at .5 sec cast with little effort. but obv we are NOT dps but faster is better if you want to max it. but take the raw ratio and figure it out not just that it's fast, fast may be worse ratio over all. talking raid dps not group obv! thats my 2 cents worth on it.

[Hulkling]

geeze it is 0.5.....where the hell did I get .75? Anyway, outside of the topic, if you have a choice of similar ratio 2 handers, then basing your choice on the sole purpose of burn fights on raids is not exactly the smartest move. But hey, if you can get both, go for it lol.

[Brohg]

Having a choice is pretty typical these days. Every tier of content in SoF has a set of 2h - fast piercer, middle slasher, high dmg basher - all very (very) nearly the same ratio.

[Siocnarf]

[knytul]

soooo...what does ALL this have to do w/ pallys givin a damn about shadowknights?

[kruelcon]

All i was saying is that we are not held back to the slower delay weapons like sk's are due to not having to cast on a dps burn that was my point for raid situations. and he was talking about maximizing his raid dps.

[Hulkling]

[Normy]

Overhaste is something that needs to be added to this topic. Does anyone have a good list of pally usable overhaste items?

I'm looking for something I can group and get. I will get crap from some folks in my guild if I take the FC2 overhaste, and I have a life so I can't compete with all the asshats that are perma farming the item from LGuk. Any ideas?

[Opfor]

http://raidloot.com/Effects.aspx?cat=C+Haste+v3

Don't tell EGN I shared.

[shiftie]

I got a few friends together and trio'd the mob in qvic (zoo event). All you will need is a healer and a dps. Mobs have a crapload of hp's and when the animals spawn they can bring the dps. If not for their insane amt of hps you could solo them, I soloed the actual mob until 75% when the adds spawned with ease - when they spawned I gate hammered out and brought back friends. Took me 3 kills to get the item to drop. Good luck

cheers,
shiftie

[dindaur]

its also worth noting overhaste drops off SoF group named too

[Linc]

Hi Folks,

Thank you for all the posts and discussion this has generated, having just started a new job I have not had much time to focus on EQ over the last few weeks but this weekend I hope to take all the extra thoughts and comments and include them in a revised version so all this experience and information can be in one place.

Linc