Damage shield dps analysis: Magician

[Snaggles]

I have a 60 mage I sometimes bring when a dps is needed. A focused water pet is actually pretty solid for this 1-2 group stuff doing mid 40’s to mid 50’s dps if a max summon and positioned well but I was curious how a DS adds to the dps. Granted the effect isn’t cumulative but when I’m tanking I’m always shocked how seldom I have a caster DS on me besides my 9pt Ragefire arms and Ring 8 (mages are scarce and druids seem rare to DS the tank, in my experience). Plus there are some situations you can know for a fact if you will be the only DS class there and can directly attribute this in considering the choice of which character to bring.

This is from a few tanking logs for my 60 pally. It’s how many hits I took once engaging the npc and I had full aggro lock for the duration of the fight. It’s obviously not scientific law but basically shows the what-if of using a max mage DS (-1 if a Druid) and a shaman DS potion at level 60.

brother Zephyl (level 61)- quad attack mob
112 hits in 85 seconds
Hits per second: 1.31
33pt DS: 43.2dps
64pt DS: 83.84dps

A Kromzek Captain (level 58)- double attack mob unslowed
38 hits in 58 seconds (approx…compared a few parses)
Hits per second .48-.58 (depending on parse)
33pt DS: 15.84-19.14dps
64pt DS: 30.72-38.28dps

plasmatic priest (level 55) double attack mob unslowed (caster)
89 hits unslowed 341 seconds
Hits per second: .26
33pt DS: 8.58dps
64pt DS: 16.64dps

Sir Lucan (level 48), double attack mob and slowed 75%
23 hits 160 seconds
Hits per second: .14
33pt DS: 4.62dps
64pt DS: 8.96dps

I’m not sure if some npcs attack quicker besides those hasted by a local friendly npc. I expect running evasive and with natural skill caps a warrior of substantial gear would take less hits thus less damage shield dps (or a knight with better gear than I have plus some luck). That said, this probably represents a fairly wide range of encounters.

A slowed Lucan seems to hit one quarter as much as the Kromzek Captain so the math on Turgurs at 75% reduction all but lines up. Interesting enough a frequent casting npc like the Plasmatic Priest with long cast times (CH attempts) has a melee rate almost on par with being slowed.

Damage shields obviously do not scale like slow but do add a noticeable amount of kill speed. Not every tank will have ragefire arms and even a ranger can do a 17pt DS (21 with call of earth). With all the scout rolls I’ve attended I can’t recall being DS’ed more than a few times and rangers are always there. While 12.18dps doest seem like much it’s certainly something so if you can DS the tank you might as well. It’s up to another quarter of the average ranger’s dps and up to half of a mage pet so definitely worth taking up a gem slot.