seanzgt

Thought I would write up a spell attack sequence to any Dirge's out there that might be interested to maximize their DPS. I've spent hours perfecting this through countless dummies and it works for me and helps me parse the highest.

This goes for anyone that uses a melee weapon and I couldn't stress it enough:
TIME YOUR ATTACKS.
How? Using those purple bars that are above and below the Hate Meter. What they are are a countdown to your next melee attack. After you use a melee attack on a mob (not a combat art or spell attack) a bar shows up on top for your main hand, and a bar below for your secondary. When the bar is full (or goes all the way to the right) is when your next melee attack is due. Now the key here is to cast your spells and combat arts when these bars are doing their countdown, for Dirges its approx 4 seconds (without CoB or other Haste spells). If your bar is about to complete, don't start casting a 2 second spell. The reason why you do this is so you don't delay your next melee attack, you want that attack to happen when its due and if you cast a spell, the melee attack wont commence until the spell is finished. This will make it so you can deal as much damage as possible during the fight because your melee attacks are 50% of your outputting damage and you want to log in as many of those melee attacks as possible.

Ok now here is my attack sequence:

Cacophony of Blades on pull - Bump - Misfortune's Kiss - Clara's Chaotic Cacophony - Lucky Break - Verlien's Keen of Despair (MELEE ATTACK 1) Shroud - Scream of Death - Darksong Blade (MELEE ATTACK 2) Luda's Nefarious Wail - Daro's Dull Blade - Thuri's Doleful Thrust (MELEE ATTACK 3) Wail of the Banshee - Evasive Maneuvers (MELEE ATTACK 4) Lucky Break - Tarven's Crippling Crescendo - Howl of Death (MELEE ATTACK 5) Jarol's Sorrowful Requiem - Turnstrike (MELEE ATTACK 6)- Piercing Stab (if you are half elf) Daro's Dull Blade - Thuri's Doleful Thrust

That is the first cycle of attacks. Once your spells refresh use them as they come up. This attack sequence works best for named mobs or mobs with a lot of health. Dirge's deal the most damage and can top the parse (equipment depending) usually with 30 second fights and higher.

For encounter fights focus on cycling through Jarol's Sorrowful Requiem and Wail of the Banshee towards the beginning of the fight after the (MELEE ATTACK 1) sequence and reuse as often as they refresh.

For quick kills and low life mobs focus on your fast casting combat arts (Darksong Blade, Daro's Dull Blade, Thuri's Doleful Thrust, Evasive Maneuvers, and also Luda's Nefarious Wail) use these after Cacophony of Blades on pull and your Bump/Misfortune's Kiss. These spells happen to be your highest damaging ones, so use them as often as possible.

NOTES:

- Using Bump/Misfortune's Kiss at the beginning is because the Twelve Tone Earstone grants a casting speed buff for your spells. I would still suggest to use this attack at the beginning if you do not have the Earstone. However, you may need to adjust your spell sequence if you cannot cast the spells fast enough before your melee attack is due. Make adjustments.

- Make sure to use Lucky Break (your heroic opportunity) as often as its available. I have 2 on my hotbars to make them faster to get to.

- I cast the 3 debuffs at the beginning because I have time to use them after Bump/Misfortune's Kiss and adds a significant damage output increase for you and your group members. Of course, disregard the debuffs on short fights.

- Make sure you are quick to queue your next spell sequences while your other one is casting but make sure you do not over ride when your melee attack is due.

- I'm not 100% if the default UI or any other UI has the purple bars for the melee attack timers. I use Fetish Nightfall and it's available on it.

- Each fight will be different. It may call for you to use different abilities at different times. Use your best judgment and practice til you are comfortable with it. This is how my setup is and it works for me, it may not work for everyone.

ENJOY!

Here is a screen shot of my Hotbars if this helps. Notice that I have my Hate Meter in the center above where my spell casting meter is.

http://i79.photobucket.com/albums/j1...EQ2_000125.jpg

Vlix_Oasis

Lanet's is crap. If you use it, you fucked up your casting order. Daro's is too good not use more than you do. Where are your heroic opportunity chains? If your going to use Tarven's and Verlien's, you might as well make it into a HO.

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Dibbis

i have a little more detailed one i made to help some old guildies out and a friend. can post it i guess... just gotta find it :P

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AnaJu

thanks for the tips

Dibbis

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Kall

Good stuff.

Added your post to Casting Order Help 1st post.

Orani

Yeah, my cast order is about 90% like Dibbis.

I was suprised that Tarvens was not casted sooner in the order since the OP casts Clara's so soon. Tarven's defense debuff would help your autoattacks even though I realize that rogues/predators defense debuff quite well. I don't know what the cap would be on such debuff issues.

In raid context, if ya got the 2 or 3 dirges to maintain constant CoB, then I think CoB on pull is ok. Otherwise, I would not cast CoB on pull since not many use range attacks and ya will get more benefit out of CoB when most are in melee range so I cast CoB once the mob is within ~15 meters of the group/raid.

I have not seen a difference between (Bump + M.Kiss) vs (Shroud + M.Kiss). (Bump + Scream) work well with each other's recast. (Shroud + M.Kiss) allows ya to activate M.Kiss asap since ya have only ~4 seconds cushion to cast M.Kiss untill ya lose the cast speed buff from 12Tone. With Bump's ~27s recast, this is another reason why I think the (Bump + M.Kiss) does not jive. Also, on rare occasions, Bump can actually be resisted. When attention is paid, a fella can actually cast two Bumps within one Scream cast and two shrouds within one M.Kiss cast.

If do not have 2 or 3 Dirges to maintain constant CoB, then on pull I :
1st) range macro = equips bow, /autoattack 2 (range attack), then Messenger's Letter
2nd) banshee macro = HO starter, Verliens, Banshee
3rd) by now, mob normally is within 15 meters or so I autoattack, cast CoB (if needed), then Shroud+M.Kiss, then proceed with big hitters while timing autoattacks.

When chain pulling tho, I always cast M.Kiss, if w/12Tone, the first thing.

Dirge's green debuffs do not stack so pointless to cast them if another dirge is casting the debuffs so I try to coordinate. If not, then I mix them in my casting routine. The green debuffs are nice on encounters and not great on single targets, but I still mix them in my casting routine if there is not another Dirge casting them.

Verliens Keen's ~19s recast is faster than it's ~26s duration so pointless to cast Verlien when it is castable. So, I paired it with Banshee since Banshee as a HO stepper to get wheel for Banshee to complete. I still cast Verlien too much, but this is a good thing is PoM is activated. The same deal with HO macroing Darksong and Tarven. Tarven's ~40s duration is quite longer than Verlien, but Tarven is a bit different vs Verlien since it incurrs damage upon cast.

I have 3 HO macros : (Verlien+Banshee) ; (Tarven+Darksong) ; (Cheap Shot + Daro's Dull). Daro's Dull does not complete the HO so properly casting some other spell/CA to complete the wheel.

Bravo's Dance is the scout's rare HO reward. The Dance gives +49 Attack Speed and +57 DPS mod for like ~6-7 minutes. So, depending on your group setup, Bravo's Dance can be a godsend, no help at all, or only nice for one of its mod buffs. When I get Bravo's Dance and able to switch jewelery, I take out my str MC DPS ring to equip a +DA/+MC ring only for the duration of Bravo's Dance.

Schwindler's Luck is the scout's uncommon HO reward. The Luck buffs combat skills by +28. So, once again, depending on group setup, Schwindler's Luck might be useful.

I mainly have HO macros to aim at receiving Bravo's Dance.

Be aware when to and when not to cast DoTs so to obtain the full benefit of the DoT.

When rezing, time it with autoattacks if ya able to find the player this fast.

That's about it I think. Writing all this offhand so I am probably forgetting something.

seanzgt

Edited to include Heroic Opportunities.

You are right. I forgot all about putting the Heroic Opportunities in. I do use them in groups but being that usually the sequence gets performed before I can finish It I didn't think to add it. But I have now, thanks for the pointer. And yes Lanet's is definitely crap. I only added it because I might have as well used it while waiting for spell cool downs. Adding the Heroic Opportunities now though, I don't have room for Lanet's. But you can still cast it if spells are waiting for cool downs, after your initial sequence. Doesn't hurt!


Dibbis:

Good posting. Thanks for the added info. However, I dont completely agree with all of it. Take note though to what I said,

"- Each fight will be different. It may call for you to use different abilities at different times. Use your best judgment and practice til you are comfortable with it. This is how my setup is and it works for me, it may not work for everyone."

Yuka

I pretty much been using Dibbis's cast order since I started playing a Dirge and I can say without a doubt its easily the best for any situation.

Orani

Hmmm, don't know about that one. Our DoTs are useless if not allowed to go to their full term which is ~14s-16s.

When chain pulling, not wise to go into range distance just so ya can do the initial range attack

In single target encounters dieing in under ~25s-30s, then I think the ~1s cast time for green debuffs are quite useless.

I would recommend at least two HO macros, which can be worked in without hurting DPS, to get a better chance at Bravo's Dance.