So that’s at least two situations were the performance improvements are present without Proton, hence you cannot logically claim they’re due to Proton, even indirectly.

Except these tests were almost certainly being run on SteamOS using WINE with Proton. We can’t know what the numbers would be with any other setup without doing it. Would a Protonless DXVK for WINE run just as well? We can’t know from these figure.

Also, Proton does not require running through WINE. I play Epic, GoG, and otherwise sources games with Proton not through Steam all the time. It’s also more than just DXVK. That’s a big part of it though.

No one is arguing that DXVK isn’t important or anything like that. They’re just saying Proton is a piece of this, which includes DXVK. I don’t know why you’re arguing.