How do you measure TPS?

[Bloodyhelln]

I've recently put an interest in monitoring my Threat per sec, since i've changed spec and experience low and sometimes spiky TPS, and in my conquest to analyse this and figure out a solution to it, i've been watching TPS numbers from Omen3. It appears that it looks at a sliding window of a set amount of seconds. Default it's set to (i think) 10secs, thus yielding ?? up until 10secs into a fight, and then giving me a number. I lowered this value to 3secs because i wanted numbers earlier on, but ofc the "history" gets more sensitive to spikes now.

So i tried out a threat addon which built on the threat addon blizzard had in mind, but which was removed prior to release. It was modified a bit by the author, and calculating TPS from combat-entry to combat-exit, which in a lot of ways is more acccurate. The problem with that is that if i suddenly start to slack, the TPS will not fall at a pace that will allow me to notice. It will in other words show me the actual average TPS through out the fight.

So what im actually after is something that will use like the combination of the two: present TPS from the start of the fight up to ie. 10secs, then start sliding, so i always have my last 10secs of threat to base my TPS upon. Doesen't that sound more usefull?

Let me know what you think. I might pose this suggestion to the Omen3 author.

[Satorri]

That's a nice thought, to have different scales to look at, maybe even a separate tank window with larger more clear numbers, like an "average tps" and "current TPS" entries.

Personally, TPS is a little murky. The reality is that threat IS spikey, regardless of class/spec, and it isn't worth getting too concerned with specifics. I, too, like to keep a close eye to see what my best spikes are, what my minimum cruising value is, and keep rough track of my threat profile over fights for the sake of refining spec/gear/priorities and the like, but I think it all needs to be with a heavy grain of salt. The real concern with threat is that you can keep your total above anyone on the dps, right? Well, technically you even have a margin on that, but with the in-game meter and the way they all read now that isn't represented. Really what you're looking for is two distinct threat abilities: initial threat and longterm threat. You want to know that you can either build faster or burst ahead in the first 5-10 seconds of a fight, and then that you can continually generate at least as much threat as the rest of the raid through the remainder of the fight (ideally more than, few people ride razor's edge, and it is increasingly stressful the closer you are to it).

I think the best you can hope for is a rough sense of values, and really, if your dps section can't touch your threat, then nitpicking over little changes isn't going to do much for you.

[sorednbored]

If you have a WWS Parse (google WWS if you don't know what it is) and if you go into the Tanks details, and specific fight you wish to calculate your threat, copy & paste the URL into WowWebStats Tps Calculator and it'll calculate your threat from your ability usage.

[Bloodyhelln]

We use WWS on each raid, and i've started to look at that to get the avg. TPS.

It's just that i would think it could be nice to keep watch over during the fight, and right after the fight.

Also it can help me discover if im doing something wrong, which i ofcourse will notice when the 2nd on threat in omen will start to gain on me, but still... as Satorri mentions, it's nice to know your steady TPS, and your peak TPS. Also during regemming, changing of gear, spec or rotations it's nice to know these values as it's easier to see how those values change.

[dotJEM]

Would be very nice with much much better tools for monitoring and analysing threat... WWS is ok, but at the end of the day, calculating threat from abillities will never be the same as getting the numbers of of blizzards API...

Omen3 seems to have a main focus on the DPS and healers, making them able to enshure not to overdo there threat and pull aggro...

I Can only second that we need better tools for tanks for working with there threat and rotations... not shure that will ever come though...

[Kazeyonoma]

use both addons?

[Aethelas]

I use a mod called 'sustained tps' that tells me the thread over the amount of mobs I've just finished tanking - it is not exact science by far, but it does give you a nice indication.

[bagelbite]

So what im actually after is something that will use like the combination of the two: present TPS from the start of the fight up to ie. 10secs, then start sliding, so i always have my last 10secs of threat to base my TPS upon. Doesen't that sound more usefull?

Let me know what you think. I might pose this suggestion to the Omen3 author.

Thats how omen worked before wotlk, and I thought it was better. I used to set my window to 20 seconds so it wasn't so spikey.

It's not difficult to modify the current omen to behave that way, but unless the author wants to support it, it would be a major pain to have to keep modifying it everytime you update omen.