Building a better damage meter.

by WyldKard on July 12, 2007

Most anyone who plays World of (WoW) and is running some sort of add-on, is invariably using some type of data tracking system. These so-called “damage” meters (DMs) track more than just damage-per-second, however, in that most DM add-ons track total damage output, healing done, damage taken, and a whole slew of other information. The idea behind DMs is a good one, since it allows a group to track how efficient each member is at a particular job, and shows who isn’t pulling their weight. Unfortunately, DMs have become so ubiquitous that people rely on them too much, and use them to track a singular job function. Tracking only one variable in this way is narrow-minded, and defeats the purpose of DMs aiding in the analysis of group efficiency.

For example, most DPS classes strive to top the DMs in damage output as though this is more important than succeeding in the group’s mission of completing an instance, quest, or raid. Routinely, I see Shamans throwing out high-damage spells when something lower in damage would keep aggro off them, making the tank’s job more difficult. Hunters disregard traps and spec anything but Survival to keep damage flowing out, because feigning death means they don’t have to run back to their corpse anyway. Rogues stick to the easy task of attacking the tank’s target all the time, because god forbid they engage the new add and stun-tank him until the tank has the opportunity to grab his aggro. Mages, like Hunters, forgo crowd control and spam AoE’s unnecessarily just to pop out that extra bit of damage, despite the fact that it makes everyone else’s jobs more difficult. Similarly, Warlocks don’t always summon the ideal minion for a given encounter, because they’d rather have their high-DPS minion smacking mobs around. Heck, I’ve even seen two healers refuse to agree on a main healer so one can do DPS, just because neither wanted to be second on the healing charts.

As I’ve said countless times before, the DMs are not the end-all of determining effectiveness. If they were, DPS classes would have no defensive abilities, healing classes would have no offensive abilities, and tanks would have nothing but taunts and aggro-holding debuffs. Even in WoW, where classes are often relegated to very specific roles, things are not this black and white.

So how do we fix this?

  1. There should be a default DM built into WoW, which is capable of tracking various facets of combat. This way, people won’t argue over different DM calculations, because there will be one, official algorithm for computing DM numbers.
  2. There should be a secondary DM chart, wherein buffs applied by certain characters should reflect the contribution they made to the group. For example, if Adam applies a buff to Eve that increases her attack power by 140 (giving her 10 extra DPS per paper-doll hit), then the bonus damage Eve gains should be reflected on Adam’s DM chart, not Eve’s. In this way, buffs used to assist the group reflect back upon the caster, which will properly credit players who spec for group play. For example, a Marksmanship Hunter is a singular-DPS machine whose Trueshot Aura (TSA) gives a blanket nine extra paper-doll damage to anyone affected by it. If a Rogue deals damage where TSA was factored in, the extra damage should be added to the Hunter’s damage output, not the Rogues. Similarly, if a Survival Hunter (a spec not recognized as high in DPS), procs Expose Weakness, it gives everyone bonus attack power equal to 25% of the Hunter’s agility. In a typical level-70 scenario, this means that a Rogue benefiting from Expose Weakness could gain upwards of 12 paper-doll damage. In other words, a modified DM that factors in class buffs would properly credit the Survival spec as giving more benefit to overall group DPS than the traditional Marksmanship spec.
  3. While individual tracking charts are nice, such as to isolate healing values, a uniform tracking value would be nice to compare general contribution. For example, for any given encounter or mob, a character of a given level should be expected to output, take in, or heal a given amount of damage. Based on how well character does comparative to this estimated value, they should earn points that add up to a final group contribution score. This type of calculation could be isolated to instances, which would allow developers to balance encounters in a manner that a player’s score would properly reflect. For example, if a given boss encounter assumes that every DPS class should be outputting 10l damage before the boss is killed, then any DPS character participating should have their group contribution score reflect how well they did. In other words, if a Hunter in this encounter managed to meet the 10k damage mark, he scores a neutral zero on the fight, while his Rogue friend who managed to do 12k damage earns a group contribution score above a zero (let’s say, 200 points). Meanwhile, the Mage, who died early, only did 8k damage, and so he earns a negative contribution score (lets say, -200 points).
  4. The use of support abilities should factor into the group contribution score, such as successful crowd-control spells. For example, every time a Hunter uses Frost Trap, or a Mage uses Polymorph, they should gain contribution points. For example, let’s say the Hunter in the earlier boss encounter example managed to successfully use Frost Trap on a bunch of boss adds, Should the developers deem crowd control in this encounter necessary, this Hunter gains bonus contribution points for forgoing DPS momentarily in order to chain trap the adds. So, perhaps the Hunter’s DPS only earned him a neutral contribution point score, but his trapping was useful enough to earn him 200 contribution points, which not only made up for his momentary lack of damage output, but reflects his overall contribution beyond damage.

Hopefully, games like Warhammer Online, as advertised, will stay away from overly specialized classes, making DMs less of a focus for players who think they’re awesome just because they managed to throw some extra damage into the fray at the expense of a group wipe. Unless all other contributions are weighed in such that players can compete on a common scale, there will always be too many DPS characters who are less concerned about group success than personal glory.

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