Why choose single target over AOE?

Actually, yeah, not sure what I was thinking. Probably leftover from the previous discussion about Brutes, because with normal damage boosts, the rule is "higher damage scale wins," though crits effectively add base damage and change that.

Still doesn't change the fact that even in completely ideal situations where all 7 teammates are standing near the Stalker, his claim to fame is only 6% more damage than the Scrapper that more than likely beats him in everything else.

Originally Posted by PRAF68_EU Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.

They ALL float down here. When you're down here with us, you'll float too!

@Starflier

I know my own Claws/Dark Melee/Fiery Aura/Shield scrapper is totally awesome, and doesn't even have build up.


Jeez, that reminds me: all the time I've been spending collecting shards to fill alpha slots has distracted me from leveling that KM/FA I was working on. I have to get that to 35 so I can see the PS/FE combination in action in real leveling play (as opposed to an autoleveled 50).

Just out of curiosity, how do you "notice" you're doing comparable damage to an AV (not sure if you're talking about compared to your Scrappers or those on your team)? I sure wouldn't feel confident making a DPS comparison based purely on observation. I'd want either a meter of some kind or an after the fact demo record analysis.

I'm not trying to attack you, I'm genuinely curious. (I'm spoiled by WoW addons which allow me to monitor / perfect my performance much more closely than is possible here.)

Typically, I get the sense from a combination of orange float text, or (less reliably) step changes in the target's HP based on when I appeared to attack. As you say, though, those are highly subjective.

However, I always log my chat. Chat logging also logs things like damage dealt and received. While occasionally data doesn't make it into the chat tabs, this seems more common for ranged attacks against distant foes than melee ones against nearby one. So when I get that sense of high DPS I'm referring to, I can often refer to those logs to get a sense of whether it was valid. By itself it would be basically impossible to deconvolve that from damage buffs, and DR debuffs, but I always monitor damage buffs, so unless they vary wildly through a given fight, I can get a decent feel for those. That leaves debuffs, which can still be a wild card. If I don't have a good idea how many were in play I'll generally discard that set of data, but if I do (or know, for example, that there were none) I can usually make an estimate and back out my approximate "real" DPS.

I'm not saying I do all this analysis all the time, and not just with my Stalker by any means. I do it when the fancy strikes me, when I feel like I was doing especially well. Overall, my gut feeling seems to line up well with the numbers when I check them out.

Now that's funny

Why I always advocate sets like Fire Aura and a Shield Defense equivalent for Stalkers. It's really the only thing 'wrong' with Stalkers as they yet have any offensive secondary sets. How far is the gap between Stalkers and Scraps/Brutes who gain offense from primary and secondary? And if you can calculate it, make sure to add in that hide crit at the start, and the high tier attack critting 100% around every 25 seconds in combat.

I also figure, if some of the higher encounters involve more than chaining attacks, the ability to burst your damage on command would give a better payoff than what a Scrap/Brute provide on average.

And people call me the numbers-crazy one.

Oh, I do think you're numbers crazy...just in different (and much more scientifically credible) ways.

Thanks for the explanation, Uber. I figured you'd have at least some way of confirming your performance. One more question, if I may:

You speak of consulting logs when you feel you were doing very well. This leaves me wondering how they compare on more average runs and the frequency of the two (average vs great runs).

Really only when you are on a team that has enough AoE to kill minions and LTs but not enough to overpower the content to such an extent that even the bosses are dying from the splash. Unfortunately farming and speed-running TFs are popular enough that that latter case isn't all that uncommon. People want to blast through stuff killing as many weak enemies at top speed as they can. In such situations they don't even care how much AoE is wasted as long as everything dies fast. As long as there are a lot of explosions and things falling dead left and right it FEELS like you're contributing even if it was really someone else who killed all the minions a half-second before you would have.

AoE is very good in this game but despite what many think, it's not quite everything.