Marksmanship Sniper/Sharpshooter Gunslinger Compendium

[Tibbel]

(05-08-2012 12:19 AM)Ketricel Wrote:  1. Is there a gear level when Pure MM and/or MM/Eng Hybrid pull ahead of the other one or do they stay pretty consistent across the board?

I haven't seen any evidence that those two specs shift drastically relative to each other as gear changes; although consider the following minor notes:

• Pure MM scales significantly better with weapon damage and significantly worse with tech power. Both of these stats appear only on weapons, so the only difference can come from the disparity between main-hand and off-hand weapon contribution.
  
  For example, a sniper with a Campaign-level (61) barrel but a Tionese-level (51) vibroknife will have what amounts to Columi-level (56) tech power with Campaign-level weapon damage. This isn't a huge difference, but it can exist. A gunslinger can invert this difference by switching their main and off-hand weapons, but obviously no such freedom for a sniper. (Sniping with a knife: if anyone can make it happen, BioWare can.)

• Set bonuses don't affect both specs equally.
  
  The Battlemaster Field Tech 2-piece bonus (+1 tick for Orbital Strike) will have a slightly higher effect for specs that take Pillbox Sniper, Explosive Engineering, and/or Experimental Explosives. Since OS generally accounts for less than 15% of our total DPS, the effect is small. (For example, 15% of damage * 33% increase from set bonus * say 20% difference from skills = 1% total difference.)
  
  The Rakata Field Tech 4-piece bonus (-7 energy cost for Takedown) will have a bigger effect on the Pure MM spec due to the skill Imperial Assassin increasing the value of more frequent Takedown use. The actual value depends greatly on the individual sniper's critical chance.

In summary, gear scaling doesn't significantly favor one MM spec over the other. If we're seeing noticeably better results from one spec, then changing our gear isn't going to make the other spec suddenly vault ahead. If we're close enough where these slight scaling differences could cause one spec to overtake the other, then the two specs are performing so closely that the disparity in DPS is well within the margin of error for execution, fight mechanics, etc.