...DPS high, Damage low, why?

[Abrakkadabra]

...my dps is around 800-900k but my damage compared to the rest of our raid group puts me below people doing 500-600k I cannot figure it out, is it because of versatility being my secondary stat?

[mythaelar]

Are you dying? That's the only way I can make sense of that. Otherwise if your dps is higher than theirs over the same amount of time you will do more damage.

[Abrakkadabra]

...not dying do you think Evocation might be the issue?

[EkoTheMind]

There could be two reasons; at least two reasons occurring to me right now.

1: Your conserve phase may not be maximized in terms of damage done. If during your conserve phase your damage is significantly lower than what it should be, then your damage overall is going to suffer. Even if you execute your burn phase perfectly, a botched or inefficient conserve phase is going to bring down your overall damage. This will reflect in your damage meters as high DPS and lower Damage Done than you would expect. Mathematically, the high DPS from the burn phase is an outlier and falsely bringing up your DPS which causes the problem you're seeing.

2: AoE and Cleave fights. These are not our specialty as arcane. While your overall DPS may be high, it's largely single target damage whereas other classes like Fire Mages will blow our DPS out of the water during AoE and Cleave situations. This will be reflected as temporary spikes in their DPS leading to overall increased Damage Done because they're hitting multiple targets. Think about Guldan as an example of this. Arcane mages have two options for the eye adds: one, Arcane Explosion as much as possible to deal Damage to all adds and two, save Arcane Missile charges for when eyes come out to immediately single target burn down an eye, then switch targets to another if one is up. Either way results in lower overall Damage Done because we are dealing less Damage than other classes like Fire Mage and Fury Warriors in those situations. We will stay have high DPS because of our usual rotation, but lower overall Damage Done because we are inefficient at AoE compared to other classes or we are single targeting priority adds.

My advice is to use the Details add on if you don't log your fights or to check your logs. You can analyze your patterns and correct any errors you may see. Also, test out your rotation on training dummies in the class hall. If your single target rotation for
both burn and conserve phases are correct you should see Damage Done correlate with your DPS. Don't forget your Evocation is also going to be at least three seconds of no Damage Done causing a decrease in both damage categories. As someone who primarily plays Arcane, and only plays Frost when my RL requests, as long as you are contributing to your raid with meaningful boss damage, low damage taken, correct execution of mechanics, and playing your class well, your numbers don't mean you're a bad raider.

I hope this helps.
-Ekode, Thrall

[Burra]

I have noticed this exact same thing recently. While I have no explanation for it other than "because: arcane", it only seems to show like that in Recount.

When I look at our logs on warcraftlogs.com, it shows what looks like my actual DPS vs. the worldbeater DPS (and much lower actual damage).

So it seems to be some kind of discrepancy w/ Recount.

[Deathpitcher]

It is because Arcane does zero damage unless we are casting. so time spent moving without missles and such is time of zero damage. Reccount does not take zero damage time out of your dps while warcraft logs does.

[Forrader]

2: AoE and Cleave fights. These are not our specialty as arcane.

This is wrong, Arcane has one of the most bursting AoE in the game right now and it is our specialty.
Cleave situations - yes, this is weak definitely.

[EkoTheMind]

Bursting AoE: yes, but it's not sustainable unless you're using Arcane Power on AoE. Even then, classes like Fire Mages, Assassination Rogues, DKs, Hunters, etc. all have sustained AoE that we cannot keep up with. Arcane's specialty is single target. We can contribute in AoE situations for sure, especially with talents like Nether Tempest and using Arcane Power in AoE situations, but to say AoE is Arcane's specialty when there are a plethora of other classes that do it significantly better is just false, especially when Frost and Fire mages have better AoE than Arcane.

[testacular]

Bursting AoE: yes, but it's not sustainable unless you're using Arcane Power on AoE. Even then, classes like Fire Mages, Assassination Rogues, DKs, Hunters, etc. all have sustained AoE that we cannot keep up with. Arcane's specialty is single target. We can contribute in AoE situations for sure, especially with talents like Nether Tempest and using Arcane Power in AoE situations, but to say AoE is Arcane's specialty when there are a plethora of other classes that do it significantly better is just false, especially when Frost and Fire mages have better AoE than Arcane.

Uum, sir, I have been topping pretty much any AoE situation except for maybe affli lock on Skorpyron (which he wins because of me killing off the small ones quickly anyway). You can burn AP on that, but just RoP is fine. As for sustained dmg - you can press AE pretty long until going OOM. With kilt and CU, you can make it event longer if not infinite (yes, even without resonance, you hit really high aoe dps). But be aware, by aoe I mean like 4 and (better still) even more mobs! Your dps scales directly with the amount of mobs around. Just keep pressing AE with 4 charges and you get a lot of dmg for such a dull "rotation"

And BTW I haven't really seen situation where I would need that much sustained aoe dmg. Within the duration of one RoP it usually melts down to "cleave situation" at which point you ignore it and go ST - this is where we loose DPS but again it's no longer AOE.

[Forrader]

Uum, sir, I have been topping pretty much any AoE situation except for maybe affli lock on Skorpyron (which he wins because of me killing off the small ones quickly anyway). You can burn AP on that, but just RoP is fine. As for sustained dmg - you can press AE pretty long until going OOM. With kilt and CU, you can make it event longer if not infinite (yes, even without resonance, you hit really high aoe dps). But be aware, by aoe I mean like 4 and (better still) even more mobs! Your dps scales directly with the amount of mobs around. Just keep pressing AE with 4 charges and you get a lot of dmg for such a dull "rotation"

And BTW I haven't really seen situation where I would need that much sustained aoe dmg. Within the duration of one RoP it usually melts down to "cleave situation" at which point you ignore it and go ST - this is where we loose DPS but again it's no longer AOE.

Very good note, thanks, wanted to say exactly same thing.
Also new Mantle of the Kirin Tor is so much good at AoE in M+ or Botanist like bosses where you need some what you call "sustained" dps.

[Naustis]

That makes no sense. Dps is
DMGdone:fightlenght = dps. So if you didn't die at some point, more dps always means higher dmg.

Or provide some logs so we can see that odd behaviour

[Cames]

There is also the problem of movement. Some DPS meters don't use downtown in their calculations. So anytime you are not actually casting a spell that causes damage lowers the damage done compared to dps. DOT classes and Pet Classes (as pets are mostly dots) have a big advantage in this regard as repositioning is not necessarily a significant damage done decrease, but because they are active lowers their dps. Think of an afflction lock running away from the Fel Nova on Heroic Star Augur. During a run, they are still ticking dots. You are most likely just running. Same problem on Ellisande, where you may have to soak an orb that is out of dps range from the boss. There are plenty of examples.

Each mage type has a way to deal with lots of movement - some better than others:
- Arcane - AB + AE (If Slipstream AM and Evoc)
- Frost - Ice Lance and Frozen Orb
- Fire - Scorch + all of fires instant casts

For example on Trilliax, I run around 4xAE + AB during the beam phase.

[Thudderson]

If you're issue is with ToS fights it might be the absorb shields on some bosses.

[wannalink]

If its indeed an issue with dps meter, try using Details! with "Effective time" option, this way numbers should be relatively close to what you will see on warcraftlogs.

[Kataii]

That makes no sense. Dps is
DMGdone:fightlenght = dps. So if you didn't die at some point, more dps always means higher dmg.

Or provide some logs so we can see that odd behaviour

Recount uses a different methodology. On recount if you die halfway through the fight - it holds your dps at what it was while you were doing damage. You're doing 600 K, you die recount will show 600K at the end of the fight. On the other hand skada and warcraft logs, simply divide your total damage by length of the fight. You're doing 600K on skada, you die you can watch your dps going down . At the end of the fight it might show your dps at 300K

Recount also stops counting if you're not doing damage, ie while you're evocating or running the bomb out on Krosus. It only shows your dps while you were dpsing. This methodology is helpful as it gives you additional info as opposed to just showing you the same thing 2 different ways