Hey all,

So lately I've been hearing that main stats have a soft cap, and I haven't been able to find anything online to verify if it's true. I know a Sniper who says after 1800 Cunning, he stacks power, but there's another sniper who stacks full Cunning and their DPS is about the same (tested last night). If there is a soft cap for Merc Arsenal AIM, can someone tell me what it is? My AIM is currently around 2200. If we do have a cap, I'll need to probably switch my augments over to power, but I'm not wasting the money if there's no need.

Thanks in advance,

Tye

Never heard, seen or noticed a softcap on any main stats.

Got 2228 aim myself.

There are no caps soft or hard for main stats. Ie. Aim,cunning,willpower,strength..

There is however a relationship with crit that makes main stat less desirable. For instance and unbuffed crit of 35% is near perfect. After 35% there becomes significant diminished returns.. After an agent buff and exo stim you will be a near 41% crit. Hard diminished returns..

Why is this relevant you ask..

1 Aim = .80 damage and a small addition to crit

1 Power = 1 damage and no addition to crit..

Once you are at the crit DR you are only getting the damage part of main stat. Which is less damage addition than raw power.

The one thing to concider is that there are buffs (like sorc) that add % to your current st count so some make the argument that main stat is always better.. Those people are wrong though.

After testing from theory crafters min/maxers and myself. I parse way higher when I'm optimized for power.

My aim is 2350 (can get to 2450-2500)

My power is 950 (can get to 1000)

My crit is 40.79

Accuracy is 110.26 tech

Hp is 20,010 full raid buffed

I have parsed 1500-1850 dps on pretty much all the Bosses in 16 Man HM Denova. That overal at the end of the fight , Is usually good for number 1

Couple important tips for Merc Dps

1. Your hp should be as low as humanly possible.

2. Any mods or enhancements you have should be the version that has the lowest endurance possible.

3. All of your armorings should be the 68 main stat and rest endurance.. a lot of the campaign and BH set has poor armoring.. For those pieces you should replace with Columi or Rakata shells and crafted Armorings to keep set bonuses.

So lately I've been hearing that main stats have a soft cap, and I haven't been able to find anything online to verify if it's true.

Jaspless, the value of Aim does diminish but only very very gradually, and it's more complex than just stacking Aim to a point and then stopping.

To break it down, Aim is always going to be worth more than Power but only a little more. So you should always get 18 Aim Augments over 18 Power Augments, but there are gearing options that will decrease your Aim that are better than the max Aim ones because they increase your power by more than the amount of Aim lost.

As Jholiday said, the trick (at the moment at least) is to not look so much at how much Aim or Power you have but to reduce the amount of Endurance you have, as that will give you the most combined DPS stats. At the same time you want to have the right amount of crit, surge and accuracy.

If it's easier, have a look at this profile and copy it's stats as closely as possible.

http://swtor.askmrrobot.com/character/6a8c2038-a7be-4c90-9830-1b6ba7c7f1b5

Main stats are completely linear - there are no diminishing returns whatsoever. The same goes for power btw.

Crit, surge etc does have diminishing returns.

Stacking power instead of cunning makes no sense, although 1 point of cunning will have almost the same effect as 1 point of power assuming you have the passive main stat bonuses and buffs. Ideally you should be maxing your cunning while _also_ maxing your power. Main stat and secondary stat really aren't competing for the same bonus budgets on mod - any mod that has the biggest TOTAL of the two will be the BIS.

1 Aim = .80 damage and a small addition to crit

1 Power = 1 damage and no addition to crit..

Not sure where that comes from, but afaik the actual values are:

1 Aim = 0.20 damage and 0.14 healing.

1 Power= 0.23 damage and 0.17 healing.