DPS

"DPS" is an acronym that has a couple of wildly-different meanings.

First, it can stand for "Damage Per Second", which is a measure of a character's offensive capabilities in games such as World of Warcraft. DPS in this case is a measure of damage inflicted over time.

Second, it can stand for "Doctor of Professional Studies".

This type of doctorate is considered to be a terminal professional degree. Within the realm of professional practice doctorates, DPS degrees have been comparatively rare. Pace University awarded the first DPS degree in computing in 1972. Currently, just five institutions in the U.S. offer DPS degree in disciplines such as computing, information management, occupational studies, bioethics, and organizational leadership.  In Europe and Australia, the DPS is a more popular degree, but there is still room for growth.  

The National Science Foundation considers the DPS degree to be a research doctorate equivalent to a Ph.D. degree, but the two are not interchangeable. While a Ph.D. focuses on in-depth study in a single discipline, the DPS is interdisciplinary and focuses on dynamic, complex real-world problems. The DPS best serves learners with professional experiences who can leverage their knowledge in applied research.

For BrevityQuest14.

In videogames where you have access to several weapons (looting, poaching, trading and/or crafting) there is usually a Sliding scale of Damage versus Speed: Stronger weapons are usually slow (low rate of fire, low swing speed or a mandatory "charge" before each attack) and weaker weapons are usually fast. Damage per Second (DPS) is a way of measuring the expected damage output of a weapon. DPS is calculated, in a general form, as:

DPS = Attack power (damage per attack) / Rate of attack (total attacks per second)

DPS, like many other statistics, is only a tool. A quick and dirty way of determining which weapon might be better, other things being equal. It cannot account for everything and specific strategy for each game must be applied. The gamer should consider the following when choosing a weapon:

1. Enemy numbers: A strong, slow weapon that can asplode heads in a single shot is of little use when you're swarmed by tens of enemies.
2. Elemental properties: In some games like Borderlands weapons might have additional effects and/or damage that are not accounted for in DPS. 
3. Magazine size: Maybe you can dish out considerable damage on a short amount of time, but if you have to reload constantly you're being exposed defenseless for longer.
4. Reload speed: Related to the above: what good is a weapon that can discharge its entire magazine in a second if you take three seconds to reload it?. This is an extreme example, but is something to consider in games where reload speeds are a thing and usually not accounted for in DPS.
5. Effective range:  Axes vs Snipers

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