DPS vs. DPA and EPS vs. EPA

Pardon the shoddy title, but I honestly couldn't think of a better one without overflowing the title text box. This is basically a question that's been bouncing around in my head like a piece of flubber for a long time now, and it seems like I'm just not smart enough to figure it out. Here's me hoping someone can out-and-out tell me the answer and see if that helps clear my head.

I'm talking about the ever-present question - which is better? Damage Per Second (of cast cycle) or Damage Per (second of) Activation? And which one has a greater impact? Endurance Per Second (of cast cycle) or Endurance per (second of) Activation?

Arcana once said, and I may be getting the numbers wrong, that as long as you have a combined power uptime of over 75% (that is to say, you spend over 75% of your time animating powers), then "per activation" statistics become more important, whereas if you have less than that, then "per cycle" statistics are more important. Now, it's mathematically provable that if you have a full attack chain and you replace a lower DPS, higher DPA attack with a lower DPA, higher DPS one, your attack chain will actually deal less damage over time. But the problem is that this is only really good in deciding what to take, what to use and how to use it, and even then only in regard to absolute outgoing damage.

As I remember it, the basic algorithm for "deciding" on attack chains is to take the power with the highest DPA, add it in, add in its DPS and its uptime, then add the next one over and the next one over and so on until your uptime exceeded 100% (i.e. you needed to spend more time animating than was actually possible). This gives us powers selected for their DPA, but contributing their DPS.

While that's all fine and good, here's my question: How much COST do those powers contribute? Suppose I have an attack chain figured out and it costs too much. I need to know which power in it costs the most, so how do I figure that out? Do I take EPA or EPS?

One the one hand it seems obvious - EPS gives me drain over time, so that's probably what I should be using. However, it's quite possible to self-drain yourself to almost zero so fast that power recharge stats don't come into play, such as opening up with Dark Regeneration and following that with Fireball. Or, you know, summoning and upgrading your henchmen. What that means is that sometimes it's not a question of how much endurance a power consumes over its whole cycle, but rather how much it costs short-term. As in, RIGHT NOW. If I fire off three powers and they kill my whole end, I won't worry about their recharge. I'll worry that they fire too fast and/or cost too much.

But then on the other hand, I'm reminded of how attacks are selected based on DPA, but contribute their DPS, so what am I really looking at? Am I worried about how much the power will cost me RIGHT NOW even if it recharges slowly, or will smaller attacks cost me more because they recharge too fast? Which one do I look at?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

I think it really depends on what you're looking at fighting and how. Against things like AVs and GMs where the fight will be lasting a significant time, the DPS and EPS metric is much more significant than DPA/EPA. One the other hand, if you're soloing with a blaster on -1/X1 and you're one-shotting everything you come across, then the DPA/EPA stat will be more relevant.

In general, though, the best answer is probably both. Finding the median between DPA/DPS and EPA/EPS is as important as either stat alone.

It depends on whether your endurance cache or your recovery rate is the limit you're hitting. Consuming end faster than you can replenish it in a fight is not necessarily a bad thing; running out of end before the fight is over almost always is.

Oh, if you're assuming a fixed attack chain being cycled indefinitely, and just trying to figure out which power should be slotted most heavily for endurance reduction, then it's easy. Slot the one with the highest total endurance cost in that chain first.

For a really simple example, suppose you have power A costing 5 end, B costing 7 end, and C costing 8 end, and your static attack chain is ABAC. Then the highest total endurance cost is A at 10 end.

Now, if you're trying to build a more endurance-efficient attack chain, then you're in for some bad news. Damage, endurance cost, and cast cycle for single-target powers is by and large on a fixed ratio, so the only way to consume less endurance... is to deal less damage. If you want to maximize your activity while minimizing your endurance consumption, then you want to choose attacks with the lowest DPA.

Incidentally, the above is also why increased recovery is so very good. Characters are machines for transforming endurance into damage, and there's a finite limit to how efficient you can make them - after which, the only way to increase performance is to add more fuel. What's more, the most efficient method for transforming endurance into damage, by an incredibly wide margin, is AoE. Basically, AoEs tend to be 2.5x the cost of ST attacks, but deal up to 16x the damage. But AoE also consumes a lot of endurance, and if you don't have the means to cover the cost of an AoE attack chain, that efficiency boost is unavailable to you.

(The above should not be construed as "take stamina", just singing the praises of +recovery in general.)

*blinks*

Im way out of my depth here.

*leaves*

The devs spent a long time setting up a flexible system so we didn't have to worry about what is best only what will suit our style. If you want to tank then look at dpa and slot end, if you want to scrap then look at dps and max your burst damage.

I'm confused... are you trying to minimize the EPS of a chain or maximize it's DPE?

Because of the AoE advantage, the attack sequence with best DPE is not the attack sequence with least EPS. You cannot optimize both at the same time.

Well, actually, I take that back. There's an attack in the game that has unusually high DPE, and also unusually low EPS and EPA. It's even a pool attack, so you can add it to the attack chain of any character, and it does a great job of filling any sized hole in an attack chain to keep you constantly active.

That attack... is Flurry.

You may accuse me of being facetious here, and I kind of am. But the point here is important: the best-performing, highest-efficiency attacks have a high up-front cost, and if you can't cover that cost you'll be locked into low performance and inefficiency. The reason why measures such as IOs and Stamina are so popular is because they mitigate up-front costs (EPS) to a level where you achieve not only higher performance (DPS) but also higher efficiency (DPE). A wealth of endurance (through recovery and lowered endurance costs) enables purchase of damage in bulk, which gives you more damage at a lower unit cost. To the best of my knowledge, there is no way around that.

But this conversation is about enabling your playstyle, not pushing mine. In which case, Flurry becomes a dead serious suggestion as one of the cheapest ways to generate both damage and activity. You should also be pursuing all powers and situations that give "free" damage: Fire attacks, Fury, Containment, Criticals, Scourge, and Defiance all spring to mind.

But I can't recommend many of the usual methods I'd use to increase efficiency, because most of them have unavoidable up-front costs. Hasten, for instance, increases the uptime of click damage buffs and of your most efficient powers - but it comes with an unmitigatable endurance cost, so it's out. Assault can be well worth its price in endurance, but because it consumes part of your desperately needed out of combat recovery, it's out too. The same applies to damage auras, which are AoEs with the endurance efficiency of ST attacks.

Actually, you know what'd really hook you up? Masterminds. They have an effective endurance pool of 700 end (!) to draw from, and get sevenfold (!!!) returns from Assault and other force multiplication tools. Try a Demons/Traps out for size - you have lots of things to do, the whip attacks are actually worth using because they debuff resistance, and Demons are aggressive and tough especially with the buffs and debuffs from Traps covering them.

Possibly. Imagine you use a low EPA (say, 5) attack 10 times in the 30 seconds your average fight lasts. Now imagine you have another attack, this one with high EPA (say 20) and you use this attack exactly once.

Slotting to reduce end costs by 50% in the 1st attack will save you 5x.5x10=25 end over those 30 seconds. Reducing the second's End cost by 50% will save you 20x0.5x1=10 endurance over that 30 second period.

So don't bother with EPA. Estimate the number of times you use a given attack per combat. Multiply that number by it's endurance cost. Do this for all attacks. The attack with the largest number is costing you the most end overall. Slot it for more endred.