Teras Kasi Archive
Thread: Advanced combo is not just display bugged
You can be all simplistic about it and assume "DPS is king", but that ignores the fact that there are situational differences. There are times when you want high DPH, times when you want high DPA, and times when you want high DPS. Using Combo when you want high DPA would be stupid. Ignoring it when you want high DPH would be just as stupid.
Remember, because it does the most DPH, a single hit of Combo following an armor break gets a MUCH bigger total damage bonus against the target than a single hit of any other move -- because you're effectively multiplying it (technically you're dividing by a smaller number, but that's the same as multiplying).
I'm not saying combo couldn't be better -- it probably could use a slight reduction in action cost and a slight increase in damage (per hit) -- but it's not the slug you make it out to be.
C
Brandon81 wrote:
Melee ASSAULT (mbrawler) does FAR more damage for equal or less action, and equal recharge time.
Thats just false information, testet:
Message Edited by Xipe on 06-17-2005 07:42 PM
I posted this elsewhere:
Okay, some of you understand and some of you don't, so I am going to interject and probably insult some of you who thought you knew how to play your TKM well but were not. Adv Combo is a good attack if you use it properly. It is not a high dps move, but if you know how the combat system works in SWG, you can make yourself higher dps by using Adv combo rather than by removing it from your hotbar. The first thing you have to understand is that having the ability to set your default auto-attack is your own worst enemy and your best friend at the same time. Rather than go into a lengthy discussion on why and how the SWG combat engine works, I am going to just tell you how to get higher dps with Adv Combo and let you go test it yourself.
First thing you need to do is set your default auto attack to Melee Hit. Why melee hit? Because it is the fastest recycle attack we have. Now, go up and attack something with enough HAM to last a short while. Watch how your recycle puts the little clocks on your specials on your hotbar. With Melee Hit, the little recycle clocks move pretty fast. Now, queue up (press) Adv Combo attack but press nothing else. Watch how the clocks go now. Notice that Adv Combo is on a seperate clock that is significantly slower than the rest of the little spinning clocks. Let Melee Hit cycle once (hit the target) while Adv Combo is still recycling on its own timer. Once Melee Hit has begun to recycle again Adv Combo should be done with it's little clock and you can queue (press) it again. Notice you hit quickly. The move you use every other time can change as situation dictates (imp dizzy is even slower). To maximize your dps you will interject Adv Combo whenever it pops up, but melee strike can sometimes be appropriate based on the timing of your recycles.
Basically what you do to increase your dps is to start the SWG combat engine on your fastest attack. You then slip in on every other cycle with a slow recycle attack (adv combo, improved dizzy, break armor, Adv Leg sweep, etc) and you end up hitting at the fastest possible rate and maintain your default Melee hit attack. This basically is tricking the system into allowing you an extra attack, although it is within the design of the combat engine to do so (and how SOE intended the system to work). So when fighting, to maintain the highest dps, you actually must interject your high damage / slow recycle moves every other round as a minimum. Once you get the hang of this technique you can move on to advanced techniques that allow you to do more than 1 attack in a round, but I will let you discover that on your own.
Lastly, once you have mastered the technique above with Melee Hit, you may choose to use Melee Strike as your default auto-attack. This does increase your dps slightly, however at an extreme cost in Action, particularly once you figure out the timing for 2 hits in 1 round.
BTW, this works for all profession specials and once mastered will allow you to do some serious damage. Note also that some of you might have been doing this unconsciously.
Message Edited by bikebum on 06-17-2005 09:52 PM
Message Edited by bikebum on 06-17-2005 09:55 PM
bikebum wrote:
Okay, some of you understand and some of you don't, so I am going to interject and probably insult some of you who thought you knew how to play your TKM well but were not. Adv Combo is a good attack if you use it properly. It is not a high dps move, but if you know how the combat system works in SWG, you can make yourself higher dps by using Adv combo rather than by removing it from your hotbar. The first thing you have to understand is that having the ability to set your default auto-attack is your own worst enemy and your best friend at the same time. Rather than go into a lengthy discussion on why and how the SWG combat engine works, I am going to just tell you how to get higher dps with Adv Combo and let you go test it yourself.
First thing you need to do is set your default auto attack to Melee Hit. Why melee hit? Because it is the fastest recycle attack we have. Now, go up and attack something with enough HAM to last a short while. Watch how your recycle puts the little clocks on your specials on your hotbar. With Melee Hit, the little recycle clocks move pretty fast. Now, queue up (press) Adv Combo attack but press nothing else. Watch how the clocks go now. Notice that Adv Combo is on a seperate clock that is significantly slower than the rest of the little spinning clocks. Let Melee Hit cycle once (hit the target) while Adv Combo is still recycling on its own timer. Once Melee Hit has begun to recycle again Adv Combo should be done with it's little clock and you can queue (press) it again. Notice you hit quickly. The move you use every other time can change as situation dictates (imp dizzy is even slower). To maximize your dps you will interject Adv Combo whenever it pops up, but melee strike can sometimes be appropriate based on the timing of your recycles.
Basically what you do to increase your dps is to start the SWG combat engine on your fastest attack. You then slip in on every other cycle with a slow recycle attack (adv combo, improved dizzy, break armor, Adv Leg sweep, etc) and you end up hitting at the fastest possible rate and maintain your default Melee hit attack. This basically is tricking the system into allowing you an extra attack, although it is within the design of the combat engine to do so (and how SOE intended the system to work). So when fighting, to maintain the highest dps, you actually must interject your high damage / slow recycle moves every other round as a minimum. Once you get the hang of this technique you can move on to advanced techniques that allow you to do more than 1 attack in a round, but I will let you discover that on your own.
Lastly, once you have mastered the technique above with Melee Hit, you may choose to use Melee Strike as your default auto-attack. This does increase your dps slightly, however at an extreme cost in Action, particularly once you figure out the timing for 2 hits in 1 round.
BTW, this works for all profession specials and once mastered will allow you to do some serious damage. Note also that some of you might have been doing this unconsciously
Okay... I was not saying that Adv Combo was an uber damage attack, just that as a TKM it is our best attack for increasing dps. I have to disagree with MBrawler's Melee Assault doing more damage, it is hard to document because of the text bug with adv combo, but I find that adv Combo does more damage than Melee Assault (30-50 on average). In reality, I don't see the difference as all that big a deal as there needs to be some incentive for ppl to master the novice professions. TKM by itself is on par with many of the other elite professions out there as far as damage is concerned when taken by themselves. There are actually very few *sole* elite professions that have a significant advantage over us in dps. Many are similar or slightly higher, but not until you combine other classes do you get super damage dealers that *really* outshine us. That said, would I complain if SOE upped the damage, decreased the recycle, or added a state to Adv Combo? Not one bit.
The reason I made the post above is because it seemed several people were thinking the best way to gauge the effectiveness of Adv Combo was to auto-attack with it, and that just is not the case. However, if I did auto-attack with my best damage attack (Imp Crit Strike or head hit)my dps would be abyssmal compaired to what I normally do also even though it hits for 150-250 more than my adv combo.
Geez double post getting here tonight...
Message Edited by bikebum on 06-18-2005 01:27 AM