Edit: Let me get a few recurring responses out of the way ... - We weren't uniquely terrible shots with Spindle (yet crack shots with other weapons). The guy with the highest DPS missed one crit. - We weren't using 280 Spindles and 320 other weapons. All weapons were close to 320 (most were 320). - We all had "extra special" for Spindle and "extra heavy" for Sleeper. We had full ammo for each run. A group of five players tested damage on Warpriest, using Sleeper Simulant, Black Spindle and Touch of Malice. A sixth player joined, but did not have those weapons, so he did not DPS Warpriest, instead assisting with adds and plates. The six players were: lntimidating Chlzz The Kid killah MetDiamond263 OurWildebeest Buyou (no DPS on Warpriest) Our test wasn't scientific, but we did our best to remove variables with a genuine goal of seeing which weapon did best. We did not have an agenda pro or con any weapon. And, all six of us left the test convinced of the general results. Note: all damage numbers are with no tether, WoL or Melting Point. Best potential, but tricky: ToM with BoL. This has the highest damage potential of the three weapons, but overall damage for the team wasn't better, because some people weren't as good at keeping BoL active, we bumped into each other more, etc. But with practice, this would be the best weapon of the three we tried. Damage drastically improved the second try, because this method was different enough that we needed practice. ToM first run - Best damage: 387,078 Average: 235,025 ToM second run - Best damage: 396,163 Average: 313,249 Second best (maybe best in real-world use): Sleeper. It was easier to get near max damage, maybe because the lower ROF led to more consistent crits. There was little range between best and worst damage on the team. Sleeper Best damage: 340,288 Average: 327,377 Spindle did not measure up to either. The difference was very noticeable. The highest DPS with Black Spindle on our team was worse than the lowest DPS on our team with Sleeper. Spindle Best damage: 287,167 Average: 240,709 Of the four doing DPS, three did their highest damage with Sleeper. One did his highest damage with ToM, which was the highest damage any of us individually did with any weapon. None of us did his highest damage with Spindle. General method and notes: We had five team members with the test weapons. We couldn't find a 6th with weapons, so a friend joined to help with adds and plates but did not DPS Warpriest. We always had the same guy grab aura. We did a Sleeper cycle, firing all heavy ammo, then using sniper if time remained. We did the same with Spindle (someone died so we did a second run for a valid comparison), using machine gun if time remained. Then the same with ToM and BoL. We always ran a bubble with BoL, to avoid deaths, and in the case of ToM, to let us use the weapon to its potential. lntimidating's screenshots and summary: [quote] So here are some screenshots. We didnt use any modifiers in the experiemnt (no WoL or tethers). Buyou was not part of the experiment because he didnt have the weapons (he was just helping us through totems) so he didnt shoot the warpriest at all. Killah was the aura holder every time so his damage isnt that relevant: Black Spindle: http://xboxclips.com/lntimidating/screenshots/cf4f1414-d753-4b6f-8c24-38bf80e060a9 This wasn't very consistent as you can see 197k at the low end and 287k at the high end. I only had to reload once, I had 25 shots because my exotic chest piece had bonus heavy ammo as well as my boots had bonus sniper ammo. I had just enough time to get out all my shots, if I didnt miss that one shot I couldve squeezed out some heavy ammo after making that number a bit higher. Sleeper Simulant+1000 Yard Stare http://xboxclips.com/lntimidating/screenshots/440d7d22-ce85-4b60-bc30-a4548beb2250 We were all pretty consistent here, and we were surprised to see that a combination of 12 Sleeper shots+as many 1000 Yard Stare shots afterwards led to far more damage than just dumping all your Black Spindle ammo into him. Touch of Malice, with Blessing of Light for infinite overshields: http://xboxclips.com/lntimidating/screenshots/e6e35137-4a91-46ab-becb-eb7857036a04 There's obviously a technique to doing this right, but the damage is there, and we all agreed that ToM wins the competition. Here's another screenshot of ToM damage, with only three of us doing it: http://xboxclips.com/lntimidating/screenshots/f0cb12e6-d178-4601-a0e4-975cd8954e64 Might I add this brought him down to about 40% with only three of us and NO MODIFIERS. It looks really do-able to kill him in one phase with ToM. [/quote] My advice: If you run the raid with a consistent team, you should all practice ToM/BoL. If you run the raid with LFG teams, I recommend Sleeper. Q&A Q: Why don't you just multiply damage by capacity? Did you see the Reddit thread where someone did that? You wasted your time! A: Calculations like that are good data points, but when tested in realistic settings, you learn there are hidden factors. Our goal was to see how weapons actually perform as teams use them. When theory and reality disagree, that shows gaps in the theory. Q: What are the averages? A: The average of damage done by the four people DPSing. In one case (second ToM run), it is three people. The aura holder (always killah) did some DPS, which is excluded from the average. Q: Why did you snipe and use machine guns after running out of test weapon ammo? Doesn't that cloud the numbers? A: Our test was intended to give realistic guidance about how the weapons perform. In actual use, this is what people will mostly do. Leaving it out could be deceptive - mainly, it would favor weapons that exhaust their ammunition in the same time as the aura lasts, and penalize weapons that exhaust their ammunition faster. This would lead to a skewed recommendation that might prove wrong in actual use. Q: Why didn't you test 1000YS or NTTE or SGA or ? A: We had five testers who met via this thread, had limited weapon selections, and did not commit unlimited time to the test. People were ready to leave after taking a fresh raid to warpriest and running half a dozen test cycles. Q: Why are your numbers low? I do better than that! A: Most people are used to seeing numbers with WoL and tether, and may not always remember when they saw one, two or three damage cycles' worth of numbers. Our test numbers are with no modifiers and are always one damage cycle. Q: The test isn't valid unless you are all 320, and all weapons used are 320, or at least, are all the same attack rating. A: The Warpriest is 300 light. Character light between 300 and 320 has no effect at all on weapon damage vs a 300 light NPC. Weapon attack rating can affect damage, but there was no large or intentional bias there. Weapons that weren't 320 were generally close, say 318, without any particular weapon always being lower. (We didn't compare 320 Sleepers with 280 Spindles.) In my case, all three weapons are 320. In any event, this is a smaller difference than I think is widely understood. It is linear - a 320 weapon does 3% more damage than a 310 weapon, and 0.6% more than a 318 weapon, comparing apples with apples. Q: You are just bad shots! A good shot will do better with Spindle. A: lntimidating's 287k with Spindle reflected a near-perfect sniper run. I think he said he missed one crit. It is fair to point out that actual teams vary in ability and luck. If your team is perfect, extrapolate lntimidating's number across five people. If you use LFG, our team average is realistic. Note that every DPSer on our team had Spindle, Sleeper, ToM, and was willing to run half a raid to test weapons. ie if anything, this would be above LFG average. Original post: I would like to run Warpriest with a team of six using Sleeper, as close to 320 as possible. Then run it again, everyone using Black Spindle, as close to 320 as possible.