I've been happily levelling my alt, a shadow priest, since getting my rogue to 80 and parking her a few months ago. I'm now at level 64 and last night I PUGed Ramparts with Recount up. I was truly and utterly awful, with 8% of the total damage and about half the total dps of the tank and other two who were hitting around 500. The thing is, I have no idea why I was so bad. I was in a group with a 66 DK (tank), 60 DK (dps), 59 mage (dps) and a 63 priest (heals). I'm particularly ashamed that the 59 mage put out so much more damage than me.
I've run Ramps twice before, once as dps at level 59, where I didn't have Recount up and once as a healer, with no wipes, so I knew the instance and the bosses. Although I'm an infrequent poster on these forums, I read them and try and learn from them, as well as EJ and other places. So I don't think I'm a drooling moron.
My rotation is VT, SW:P, VE, MB, MF, MF then MF keeping MB and VT up where required. I don't know if this is anything to do with it, but I barely got to MB on the trash last night before things went down as the tank was quite OP, although surely this would also have impacted on the others' dps. I managed several rotations on the bosses though with no appreciable difference.
My armory is at: - http://eu.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Draenor&n=Majolica
And yes, although stood back, I was in range! (I checked).
Sorry about the 'pls help' post, but thinking I knew what I was doing, it's come as a horrible shock to find I don't. My rogue is not nearly as dreadful - putting out about 1800dps as a fresh 80.
- Forums
- World of Warcraft
- Class Discussion
- L2P Noob or something else - why was my DPS so abysmal?
L2P Noob or something else - why was my DPS so abysmal?Follow
Though I'm not much of a shadow priest, I think I can explain your problem here. It was a combination of specific things.
First, you were playing with two DK's. When DK's leave their starting zone at 58 they leave it kitted out with blues that do not get replaced 'till they start questing in Northrend. Which means they'll have a far better kit than you do. Then, there's the thing that you were playing with DK's and mages; two classes who have very decent burst damage. A shadow priest with its DOTs is made for the long run - spriest DPS on trash sucks horribly, they're made for long endurance boss-like fights. Last, a lot of the mobs in the ramparts are demonkind - I can't confirm it, but I wouldn't be surprised if at least a couple of them had shadow resistance buffs (specifically the doom guard boss).
What you'll want to do is set recount to only show a boss fight and see if you can pull off around 540 DPS on that. As soon as you go into the 60s, the formula level * 10 ( - 100 for characters in non-optimal gear) is actually a fairly accurate representation of the amount of DPS you should be doing. Keep that in mind and try if you can follow along that line - if you can, you should be doing fine.
Edited, Aug 3rd 2009 12:30am by Mozared
First, you were playing with two DK's. When DK's leave their starting zone at 58 they leave it kitted out with blues that do not get replaced 'till they start questing in Northrend. Which means they'll have a far better kit than you do. Then, there's the thing that you were playing with DK's and mages; two classes who have very decent burst damage. A shadow priest with its DOTs is made for the long run - spriest DPS on trash sucks horribly, they're made for long endurance boss-like fights. Last, a lot of the mobs in the ramparts are demonkind - I can't confirm it, but I wouldn't be surprised if at least a couple of them had shadow resistance buffs (specifically the doom guard boss).
What you'll want to do is set recount to only show a boss fight and see if you can pull off around 540 DPS on that. As soon as you go into the 60s, the formula level * 10 ( - 100 for characters in non-optimal gear) is actually a fairly accurate representation of the amount of DPS you should be doing. Keep that in mind and try if you can follow along that line - if you can, you should be doing fine.
Edited, Aug 3rd 2009 12:30am by Mozared
3 Questions:
1.)Are you using Devouring Plague? I didn't see it in your rotation.
2.) Are you reapplying SW:P when you have 5 stacks of shadow weaving? (on a Side note, I open VT > MB > MF > SW:P > DP > MB then keep may DoTs up and use MB when it's off cool-down)
3.) Are you applying DoTs to trash mobs or just using MF? If the fight is short, skip Dot and just hit the mobs with spells (65 you'll get mind sear which is the most powerful AoE spell with large groups; expect 10k+ DPS on groups of little spiders in Naxx..). Longer trash pull it's more reason able to try and do your normal DPS rotation. Don't feel bad about trash, it's not often a strong point of shadow priests.
One other point: VT gets INCREDIBLE scaling from Spell power compared to most all of our other spelld. At high levels, getting 100% uptime on that is a big key to doing high DPS (but that's same for all our DoTs, VT is just shorter).
1.)Are you using Devouring Plague? I didn't see it in your rotation.
2.) Are you reapplying SW:P when you have 5 stacks of shadow weaving? (on a Side note, I open VT > MB > MF > SW:P > DP > MB then keep may DoTs up and use MB when it's off cool-down)
3.) Are you applying DoTs to trash mobs or just using MF? If the fight is short, skip Dot and just hit the mobs with spells (65 you'll get mind sear which is the most powerful AoE spell with large groups; expect 10k+ DPS on groups of little spiders in Naxx..). Longer trash pull it's more reason able to try and do your normal DPS rotation. Don't feel bad about trash, it's not often a strong point of shadow priests.
One other point: VT gets INCREDIBLE scaling from Spell power compared to most all of our other spelld. At high levels, getting 100% uptime on that is a big key to doing high DPS (but that's same for all our DoTs, VT is just shorter).
Scholar
26 posts
Quote:
3 Questions:
1.)Are you using Devouring Plague? I didn't see it in your rotation.
2.) Are you reapplying SW:P when you have 5 stacks of shadow weaving? (on a Side note, I open VT > MB > MF > SW:P > DP > MB then keep may DoTs up and use MB when it's off cool-down)
3.) Are you applying DoTs to trash mobs or just using MF? If the fight is short, skip Dot and just hit the mobs with spells (65 you'll get mind sear which is the most powerful AoE spell with large groups; expect 10k+ DPS on groups of little spiders in Naxx..). Longer trash pull it's more reason able to try and do your normal DPS rotation. Don't feel bad about trash, it's not often a strong point of shadow priests.
1.)Are you using Devouring Plague? I didn't see it in your rotation.
2.) Are you reapplying SW:P when you have 5 stacks of shadow weaving? (on a Side note, I open VT > MB > MF > SW:P > DP > MB then keep may DoTs up and use MB when it's off cool-down)
3.) Are you applying DoTs to trash mobs or just using MF? If the fight is short, skip Dot and just hit the mobs with spells (65 you'll get mind sear which is the most powerful AoE spell with large groups; expect 10k+ DPS on groups of little spiders in Naxx..). Longer trash pull it's more reason able to try and do your normal DPS rotation. Don't feel bad about trash, it's not often a strong point of shadow priests.
1) No, I don't use it as a rule (i.e. when soloing). That's because my rotation comes from advice given in a reasonably recent post (on here, I think) that its the one to use to get 5 points of Shadow Weaving faster than any other and my experience seems to bear this out. There was also a reference in the same post to DP not being worth the mana and I noticed once I dropped it I conserved mana better and mobs died just as quickly. Over a longer fight though I can see why it should be included in the ******* of DoTs and will do so, thanks.
2) Yes, but probably not often enough. Again, generally because things are dead before its cooldown expires... but again, I appreciate things are different in longer fights. Will add this one to the rotation.
3) Yes, I was doing my DOTs because of the longer cool down on MB, and thought I was not putting out as much damage as I could if I skipped them. I thought my rotation would equal higher dps than MB, MF, MF, MB, MF, MF to dead. I'll try this method on trash in future and I hit 65 last night, so I'm off to the trainer to get Mind Sear.
Thanks for the advice - it's reassuring to hear that I'm not a total window licker, but there's definitely stuff here I can work on. Now to see if there's anyone on my server who wants to PUG anything but Ramps...
Mind Sear is alot of fun but as a leveling SP you have not had to work with AOE before. So remember to watch for mobs breaking for you when you use it and be ready to Fade. Also remeber your tanks at this stage are also leveling up and my not be that good at tanking multiple mobs so you'll have runs where Mind Sear is a bad idea.
Several notes...
1) Make sure you have shadow appropriate glyphs on your toon. The only off spec glyph I used while leveling was shield. This way I got a mini heal when I shielded myself combined with VE made solo play that much easier. Definitely have Glyph of Shadow, and I used the one that combined synergy of MF and SWP, but cannot remember the name.
2) Remove VE from you rotation, unless your healing is having trouble keeping up DPS or you have a Pally tank that has mana issues. No need to waste the GCD on the spell, plus added aggro.
3) Last, for dps rotation, start paying attention on your MB. Pending your talent points you should get two casts of MB for each VT that you throw out there. So I think you have one or 2 extra MF's in your initial rotation. Also, pop dispersion when you are at 40 - 50% mana between fights. This will keep your mana pool up and save the Shadowfiend for bosses for a bit more dps and mana regen. (Shadowfiend should be popped when you are at about 50% mana so that you do not loose some of the mana regen.)
4) Are you having mana issues? I never did while shadow, so I would definitely use DP in my rotation for instance runs. SWD if you can steal a kill to proc your spirit tap, but otherwise I tend to avoid its use. Back to DP, you are correct in solo play that it is a mana hog and not really needed. Plus, as I am on a PvP server, it was always nice to have a back up DoT to throw on the surprise gank attempt.
1) Make sure you have shadow appropriate glyphs on your toon. The only off spec glyph I used while leveling was shield. This way I got a mini heal when I shielded myself combined with VE made solo play that much easier. Definitely have Glyph of Shadow, and I used the one that combined synergy of MF and SWP, but cannot remember the name.
2) Remove VE from you rotation, unless your healing is having trouble keeping up DPS or you have a Pally tank that has mana issues. No need to waste the GCD on the spell, plus added aggro.
3) Last, for dps rotation, start paying attention on your MB. Pending your talent points you should get two casts of MB for each VT that you throw out there. So I think you have one or 2 extra MF's in your initial rotation. Also, pop dispersion when you are at 40 - 50% mana between fights. This will keep your mana pool up and save the Shadowfiend for bosses for a bit more dps and mana regen. (Shadowfiend should be popped when you are at about 50% mana so that you do not loose some of the mana regen.)
4) Are you having mana issues? I never did while shadow, so I would definitely use DP in my rotation for instance runs. SWD if you can steal a kill to proc your spirit tap, but otherwise I tend to avoid its use. Back to DP, you are correct in solo play that it is a mana hog and not really needed. Plus, as I am on a PvP server, it was always nice to have a back up DoT to throw on the surprise gank attempt.
To be honest dks are going to top the dps list at those levels to begin with. Second spriest are some of the worst trash dps in the game just cause of how fast most stuff goes down. Some tips would be if X is second on list stick you dots on him and just mf Skull first. That should help some but dont be suprised that by the time your dots are on x that skull will be dead. Also my opinion only is might as well reroll a shaman or druid cause 3.2 really isnt going to help us at all. Plus we just got @#$% on Q&A so!!!
Quote:
To be honest dks are going to top the dps list at those levels to begin with. Second spriest are some of the worst trash dps in the game just cause of how fast most stuff goes down. Some tips would be if X is second on list stick you dots on him and just mf Skull first. That should help some but dont be suprised that by the time your dots are on x that skull will be dead. Also my opinion only is might as well reroll a shaman or druid cause 3.2 really isnt going to help us at all. Plus we just got @#$% on Q&A so!!!
FYI: This loon shouldn't be taken seriously.
Unless I have an off night, I'm to DPS on Iron Council and high DPS on most other fights in Ulduar 25 with my raid group, and there are lots of good people in that group. I've topped damage for Ignis as well, and am normally high damage. My RL is hesitant to put me on heals just because of the damage I put out. Shadow Priest still do well at endgame and raiding, we're just not "ZOMG SUP3R UB3R FACEROLL D33pZ!" We just have to be good at what we do. Keep at it, then give other things a try.
As people have said, you were already at a disadvantage in that the other DPSers were burst damage classes and SPs aren't great at trash. Don't bother loading up DoTs, just do the odd one and otherwise MF/MB (except on single high-HP mob trash, where relevant).
Otherwise, practise tightening up your rotation for bosses. VE -> VT -> SW:D (rarely used except during this rotation) -> MB -> DP -> SW:P.
Then it's a spell priority:
1) Keep VT up, time recasting so that it lands just after the last tick of the last application (be careful that it doesn't land before)
2) Keep DP up
3) MB on cool down
4) MF when not doing the rest
If you have, say, 1.5 sec before you need to reapply a high prio spell you can use SW:D. Otherwise, it's best to wait and do nothing than start a MF cast and delay a higher prio spell because of the GCD.
Otherwise, practise tightening up your rotation for bosses. VE -> VT -> SW:D (rarely used except during this rotation) -> MB -> DP -> SW:P.
Then it's a spell priority:
1) Keep VT up, time recasting so that it lands just after the last tick of the last application (be careful that it doesn't land before)
2) Keep DP up
3) MB on cool down
4) MF when not doing the rest
If you have, say, 1.5 sec before you need to reapply a high prio spell you can use SW:D. Otherwise, it's best to wait and do nothing than start a MF cast and delay a higher prio spell because of the GCD.
Really your rotations should change based on how many mobs your group is fighting and how fast they're going down. A boss is different than a group of 3 trash mobs. If mobs are really going down that fast focus on the secondary target instead of the primary. You shouldn't have to worry about aggro if you have a good tank. SP are not that great at trash at all, basically every other class outclasses them in that department.
Recent Visitors: 333
All times are in CST
Anonymous Guests (333)
- Forums
- World of Warcraft
- Class Discussion
- L2P Noob or something else - why was my DPS so abysmal?
© 2024 Fanbyte LLC