Jump to content

[DPS] Understanding the balance between stats


Evolixe

Recommended Posts

There has been a lot of discussion going on lately.

Especially now that we got some light on how Alacrity works I would like to take a moment and sit down to talk about the workings of stats and why "Mastery/Power > All" simply does not compute.

 

The idea behind your stats is that they all do something different. Mastery and Power share a lot of similarities and are unique in that department, but for the sake of the argument I'm going to view them as 1 stat for this discussion.

 

 

 

In any case, let me begin.

 

Accuracy plays no role in this discussion because it has a set amount of stat that must be reached without question.

 

Power/Mastery give you a hard damage increase. Numbers quite simply grow bigger.

 

Critical Strike does 2 things, it increases your odds of landing an extra big hit; And it increases the height of that hit.

If said hit is an autocrit, or otherwise goes over 100% Critical chance because of procs and passives, however much above 100% it goes is added on top of your Surge.

 

Alacrity just makes you do what you do, but faster.

 

 

 

Now because of the nature of the Power stat, most people think that is the all out champion of stats.

Crit is unstable and Alacrity doesn't make you hit any harder.. and hell, it makes your burst go over sooner as well.

 

 

But that is not entirely how it works. Due to the way Bioware has designed itemization in SWTOR you get easily over 8000 Mastery and 4500 Power in your gear that you just can't get around.

At this stage you already have a crapton of these stats without even specifically aiming for any of it.

 

The reason Crit and Alacrity get value is because Mastery and Power give them that value.

Let me explain it with a simple calculation:

 

1000 outgoing damage

 

1000 Mastery adds 100 damage

1000 Alacrity gives you 10% speed

 

1000 Mastery = 1100 Damage.

After 10 GCDs you have done 11000 Damage.

 

1000 Alacrity = 1000 Damage.

After 10 GCDs you have done 10000 Damage. But you get an extra GCD because you are 10% faster.

So you have 11 GCDs and 11000 Damage.

 

Both stats are equal right?

Well, not quite:

 

2000 Mastery = 1200 damage.

After 10 GCDs you have done 12000 Damage.

 

1000 Mastery + 1000 Alacrity = 1100 Damage.

After 10 GCDs you have done 11000 Damage. But you get an extra GCD because you are 10% faster.

So you have 11 GCDs and 12100 Damage.

 

Now these aren't really real-world numbers.

But I'm purely trying to prove my concept to you guys here, so bear with me.

 

As you can see, the pure Mastery build did not win it from the Alacrity Combo.

So how did that happen? How did Alacrity suddenly become worth more?

 

The answer is very simple. Because the Mastery gave Alacrity increased value.

 

It's the same with Critical Strike too.

Although that's a bit harder to put in numbers because of its volatile nature.

 

The point is; Stats increase each others value.

Diving all-in into 1 stat is never good because the other stats are SO GOOD when you have very little of them.

 

Once you reach a certain level of Crit AND Alacrity, Power will once again take the throne.

What you want to do is find a healthy balance.

 

I often hear people talk about "Diminishing Returns" and the likes though.

Something I want to be very clear about is that there is no magical impenetrable steel door that says you can't go above 1700 Crit or else your Computer is going to blow up. That is not a thing. Your other stats give Crit value.

And it can very well still be better than any alternative at 1700 Crit even if the stat seems like it gives far less point for point than it does at lower levels. That's the idea of the stat.

 

I don't know the exact relative value of Power or Mastery to Crit

(especially because that value will constantly change the more you get of every stat)

But what I can tell you is that neither Power nor Mastery are worth 4 to 8 times what Crit or Alacrity are worth.

Still often people easily invest that many times more into it than the other stats. If them don't disregard them completely.

 

 

 

At the end of the day, this is why pretty much every dps now wants at the very least enough Alacrity to get to the lowest threshold and get a 1.4GCD (7.15%). Because otherwise you got about 2100 Crit and put the rest into Power.

All the while that Power and Crit making your Alacrity so much better.

 

I would honestly not be surprised if every DPS spec out there wants the 1.3GCD (15.39%) though.

Especially if your class has passive alacrity and only requires like 1500 (IDK the exact) Alacrity to get that 1.3GCD.

 

With high Alacrity builds you just put whatever you got left in secondary stats into Crit.

Even if that puts you past 2000 Crit. There is just no way in the world that the Power is worth more.

Edited by Evolixe
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 4 weeks later...

The question is whether the 1.3s GCD is worth it if you don't already have an innate alacrity bonus in your spec.

 

You invest heavily into a stat that only gives you a benefit when A) your reaction and your internet are fast enough to make proper use of being able to push that button 100ms earlier, and B) the situation allows you to use it (if you don't get out of that circle instead you might do zero dps for the rest of the fight).

 

On the other hand, I'm not really convinced of the GCD thresholds being the set values of Alacrity you should have. Even without lowering GCD, higher alacrity shortens your ability cooldowns and improves your energy regeneration, so I still prefer 1200ish Alacrity, especially on tech classes where low energy is a bigger issue.

Edited by Mubrak
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 9 months later...

ignoring buffs to make the math clear:

mastery gives 0.2 damage per point and 0.2*(1-(1-(0.01/0.2))^((mastery/level)/5.5)) crit

power gives 0.23 damage per point

crit: 0.3*(1-(1-(0.01/0.3))^((crit_rating/level)/0.8))

surge from crit: 0.3 * ( 1 - ( 1 - ( 0.01 / 0.3 ) )^( (crit/ level) / 0.8 ) )

alacrity: 0.3*(1-(1-(0.01/0.3))^((alacrity/level)/1.25))

the cast time is reduced by alacrity like new_cast_time = cast_time/(1+alacrity). so the factor that dps is increased is cast_time/new_cast_time=(1+alacrity).

 

for each ability you have:

 

damage per second = (base damage + bonus damage) * (1+*crit_chance*surge) * (1+alacrity) / cast_time

 

then you add all the abilities, buffs and debuffs for a set rotation.

 

you then use the fact that all points are limitied and tied to eachother through gearing restrictions and you get an equation to solve to maximize dps

 

this is all complicated by offhand accuracy, procs, set bonuses, damage reduction, autocrit maths, etc.

Edited by dipstik
Link to comment
Share on other sites

×
×
  • Create New...