Powertech/Vanguard DPS Compendium

[Jaynen]

(01-08-2012 03:38 AM)Jaynen Wrote:  

(01-04-2012 09:52 PM)Oyxl Wrote:  I'm also planning on experimenting with the following build, as soon as I do get to 50.

http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#301hMo...rZfGbbzh.1

It should be the mother of all heat ventilation builds:

- Keep up Incend. Missile debuff
- Flame Burst procs free Rocket Punches
- Flame Burst and Rocket Punch proc free Rail Shot
- free Rail Shots on burning targets vent 8 heat
- when overheating (40+) switch to High Energy Gass Cylinder


There's a few wasted talent points, so I'm in doubt about damage output, but than again, there's so much heat venting, that it should allow you to replace nearly all Rapid Fire. Theoretically.

I hit 50 and am gearing now, I will give your spec a try. I think I will try adjusting it slightly

for one I am not sure whether high energy cylinder is even needed, second hitman is probably pretty useful as in raiding so far you want to interupt a lot of stuff

Tried it, didn't play that well imho, you spend too much time fishing for procs with flame blast. It's so heavily proc based it makes it hard to adapt to the situation, using high energy cylinder was a must, you can keep the burn effect on the target for railshot with incend missile

[Weidekuh]

I had a feeling that superheated rail (30% arp) and puncture (60% arp) don't stack. i had a spec with both talents and respecced thermal detonator at 40 for some pvp funsies.
Now i'm 41 and i tested the following:

Railshot tooltip damage: 769 - 912 -> avg. 840.5

against normal lvl 36/37 mobs in quest. other talent affecting damage: rain of fire (+3% dam), firebug (+30% crit damage)

damage with superheated rail only: 30% arp.
normal: 825, 895, 796, 895, 854, 771, 882, 773, 733, 794 -> avg 821.8
crit: 1623
glance(?): 511

superheated rail + 1 point puncture: 50% arp.
normal: 863, 872, 831, 888, 820, 893, 887, 860, 797, 876 -> avg. 858.7
crit: 1602, 1677

It seems to work as intended. (I know, the number of test are statisticly not significant)
would still be very interesting if someone could do the same at lvl 50. take a (merc) healer buddy, start a duel and railshot away. so we could calculate the % increase of the arp. talents.

[Jaynen]

This is what I am using now.

http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#301hMG...ZZbIbbdh.1

It's better for solo since you don't gain much by using combust cylinder over ion. Also as far as tanking goes you lose 3% dmg mitigation from the normal tanking build (1 ion screen, 2 powered armor) and 10% shield chance from empowered tech.

However you gain 2% defense and 3% endurance. You also give up heat blast but will now vent hit on stuns/incaps/immobilizes/knockdowns and when using railshot on a burning target

[swift]

With regards to ArPen stacking: I posted a few samples in the Merc Arsenal thread here:
http://sithwarrior.com/forums/Thread-Ars...51#pid8251

The results indicated that different ArPen effects might simply not stack.

[Oyxl]

(01-08-2012 07:42 PM)Weidekuh Wrote:  I had a feeling that superheated rail (30% arp) and puncture (60% arp) don't stack. i had a spec with both talents and respecced thermal detonator at 40 for some pvp funsies.
Now i'm 41 and i tested the following:

Railshot tooltip damage: 769 - 912 -> avg. 840.5

against normal lvl 36/37 mobs in quest. other talent affecting damage: rain of fire (+3% dam), firebug (+30% crit damage)

damage with superheated rail only: 30% arp.
normal: 825, 895, 796, 895, 854, 771, 882, 773, 733, 794 -> avg 821.8
crit: 1623
glance(?): 511

superheated rail + 1 point puncture: 50% arp.
normal: 863, 872, 831, 888, 820, 893, 887, 860, 797, 876 -> avg. 858.7
crit: 1602, 1677

It seems to work as intended. (I know, the number of test are statisticly not significant)
would still be very interesting if someone could do the same at lvl 50. take a (merc) healer buddy, start a duel and railshot away. so we could calculate the % increase of the arp. talents.

It's funny, I actually also thought that it's currently not stacking, be it cumulative or additive. I made the same mental note to check this in the near future, myself.

Keep us posted.

[Asmiroth]

I wrote a spreadsheet to help get the numbers going and see what the damage was per cast time. I checked both builds and while tough enough to math out (Retractable Blade's Internal HEGC bonus for one), I came up with the following numbers. I have been unable to put in the armor-pen skills as I'm not sure how they are working. It should make Rail Shot move up the list though and would help it compete with the elemental attacks that are not affected by armor.

These numbers assume: Unload, Flamethrower, DFA have 4 ticks, RB has 5 on the DoT and IM has 6 on its DoT. Using Rakata Eliminator gear, no relics, Overkill as a weapon, full group buffs, enemy armor = 35%.

Prototype numbers:

Flame Thrower (5 stacks) - 2192
Death From Above - 2012
Flame Thrower (no stacks) - 1523
Retractable Blade - 1520
Rail Shot (Crit) - 1481
Rail Shot normal - 1281
Immolate - 1272
Rocket Punch - 1258
Explosive Dart - 1025
Flame Burst - 899
Rapid Shots - 809

For the Pyrotech Build, assuming target is on fire, I get:
Incendiary Missile - 2065
Death From Above - 2044
Thermal Detonator - 1806
Rail Shot - 1609
Flame Thrower - 1523
Rocket Punch - 1377
Explosive Dart - 1041
Rapid Shots - 882
Flame Burst - 803


So these numbers would move the priority listing for Prototype to:

Rapid Shots > 15 heat
Flame Thrower (4+ stacks)
Death From Above
Flame Thrower (no matter the stacks)
Retractable Blade
Rail Shot (crit or not)
Immolate
Rocket Punch (free or not)
Explosive Dart
Flame Burst

and for Pyro:

Rapid Shots > 15 heat
Incendiary Missile
Death From Above
Thermal Detonator
Rail Shot
Flame Thrower
Rocket Punch
Explosive Dart

Interestingly, Incendiary Missiles' Heat cost is such that it barely edges out using Rapid Shots, in order to regain the 17.5 Heat cost. I would need to model the difference between using IM and Flame Burst as I'm not sure how the RNG would work out for Combustible Gas - in order to have the burn effect active. Procs that proc other procs are fun!

[Jaynen]

Are you saying you tested this while using full Rakata gear or you plugged Rakata gear numbers into the spreadsheets?

Also by Rapid shots > 15 heat I assume you mean if you are over 85? But don't you want to try to keep things below 40? (which never usually happens)

My flamethrower shows 2053 dmg on tooltip and most my gear is tank gear, a 5 stack proto flamethrower should be 2053 +6% from intimidations +50%

[GWARRR]

@Asmiroth: For your Pyrotech priority flow, I'm not sure Incendiary should be listed that high. Its heat cost seems prohibitive enough that it is something you'd only really use to refresh the DoT or apply it to a new target. Since it is a DoT, the damage #s look fine but since the heat is frontloaded, it will throw off your rotation if you use Incendiary Missile too often since it means that you may have to use Rapid Shots way too often, thus lowering overall DPS. Also, I don't think you can ignore Flame Burst in that priority given the fact that Incendiary's Heat cost is prohibitive for spam usage, which is what your priority flow implies. The DPCT numbers do look very good for Incendiary Missile but with the heat cost and the DoT part of it, it's not something you can stick that far up your priority flow without major consequences in heat management.

Also, mostly in terms of formatting, your priority flow essentially says that you will never cast past Incendiary Missile since it has no cooldown. You'll cast Incendiary Missile, go back to the top of the list, Rapid Shots, then when you're back under 15 you'll hit Incendiary Missile again, meaning you never progress down the priority flow past Incendiary Missile and get to some of the other good PT stuff.

(01-10-2012 05:49 AM)Jaynen Wrote:  Also by Rapid shots > 15 heat I assume you mean if you are over 85? But don't you want to try to keep things below 40? (which never usually happens)

It is as he said, you prioritize Rapid Shots when you're above 15 Heat. This is because with the costs of abilities, if you are above 15 and cast a 25 Heat ability, you drop a heat regen bracket which is rather punishing. Therefore, if you're above 15 heat, you go ahead and use Rapid Shots to make sure your next heat cost ability does not encounter this problem. I have been able to get away with using Rapid Shots around 20-25 heat (I am saying this as a Merc, but it may apply for PT play on occasion), but that is because based on how my rotation/priority flow shakes out, I can anticipate what my next skill is and so adjust accordingly given if my next move is a channel, an activation, or an instant. But for specs that have a ton of 25 Heat abilities, 15 is a pretty good breakpoint. Pyrotech Powertechs are a great example of where you may want to abide by 15 as a firm threshold for going into Rapid Shots.

[Asmiroth]

(01-10-2012 05:49 AM)Jaynen Wrote:  Are you saying you tested this while using full Rakata gear or you plugged Rakata gear numbers into the spreadsheets?

In a sheet. I know of no one that has full Rakata gear at this point - I don't believe that's possible with lockouts.

Quote:Also by Rapid shots > 15 heat I assume you mean if you are over 85? But don't you want to try to keep things below 40? (which never usually happens)

Pick the heat number you want. I used the terms from the original post. I personally try to stay between 15-20 Heat total.

Quote:My flamethrower shows 2053 dmg on tooltip and most my gear is tank gear, a 5 stack proto flamethrower should be 2053 +6% from intimidations +50%

Tooltips for all abilities, for all classes, are wrong. Abilities are based on your level, not your rank, and the damage you do is often times quite different than what you think you should do. Flamethrower is affected by Prototype Cylinders, HEGC, Intimidation, Steely Resolve, Prototype Flame Thrower and Prototype Burn Enhancers. Not to mention group buffs. It's elemental, so not affected by armor either.

The numbers I posted are based on cast time. Flamethrower takes 3 seconds to cast, so if yours does 2053 then it has a Damage Per Cast (DPC) of 684. A 5 stack of Flamethrower does, on average, 6576 damage at OPS level with 5 stacks.

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(01-10-2012 06:00 AM)GWARRR Wrote:  @Asmiroth: For your Pyrotech priority flow, I'm not sure Incendiary should be listed that high. Its heat cost seems prohibitive enough that it is something you'd only really use to refresh the DoT or apply it to a new target. Since it is a DoT, the damage #s look fine but since the heat is frontloaded, it will throw off your rotation if you use Incendiary Missile too often since it means that you may have to use Rapid Shots way too often, thus lowering overall DPS. Also, I don't think you can ignore Flame Burst in that priority given the fact that Incendiary's Heat cost is prohibitive for spam usage, which is what your priority flow implies. The DPCT numbers do look very good for Incendiary Missile but with the heat cost and the DoT part of it, it's not something you can stick that far up your priority flow without major consequences in heat management.

I mention that at the bottom of the post. I would say that Flame Burst is a better option to keep a burn effect active and to simply ignore IM completely. I would need to model it to prove it though. IM needs either more damage (through better scaling) or it needs to have the Heat cost dropped in order to be worth the cast.

[Jaynen]

Yeah I was just clarifying. Totally makes more sense now when thinking of the cost of a 25 heat move ontop of the 15. I use IM right now just to keep the burn effect up when I am using ion cylinder and tanking. I really don't like it and it seems way too expensive but I like having railshot vent heat