I think I've done at least 15 or so parses with the new build Tac has suggested in Melee sabo. I'm averaging around 5100 with 640 Alacrity Rating (2 enhancements & 8 Augs). I'm going to try 1 enhancement and 11 augs to see if the benefits of surge outweigh the overall damage.

 

Edit: Actually... I just hit 7% Alac flat with 1 enhancement and 9 augs. The DR is noticible at this point, so I might try a few with this setup.

 

Do you think it will have a noticable improvement in operations?

Do you think it will have a noticable improvement in operations?

 

So I did some parsing over the past couple of days on just a 1 Mil dummy, but the RNG was **** there most of the time so I don't have conclusive results there.

 

As for the bosses in the operations themselves, I did break a couple of my records using the new 600 Alac build, but IU don't want to confirm anything until I know for sure what is the most optimal. If you suffer from lag of any type, I would highly suggest not running it. The MS augs are better at that point.

 

My methodology is this: The DR changes get noticible after about 400 points of Alacrity, and seeing that I was doing well with the full Main Stat augs earlier, I'm going to assume that a lower amount of Alac will be optimal. The 400 Alac is what I will be shooting for.

 

I'm busy-ish at the moment, and I also don't feel like doing a whole lot of parsing myself, but I promise that I will do some more testing to see what works/doesn't work.

 

Note to everyone else: It looks like Saboteur is getting a very big change coming in 3.2. Scatter Bombs will be utter useless in PvE, so expect an update when the update hits live.

Edited March 22, 2015 by Camelpockets

Ive really REALLY tried to do well with a saboteur sniper in pvp, just isn't working out for me. Their single target damage is simply wayyy too low , I want it to work out...but I switched to dirty fighting and am having much better luck.

Ive really REALLY tried to do well with a saboteur sniper in pvp, just isn't working out for me. Their single target damage is simply wayyy too low , I want it to work out...but I switched to dirty fighting and am having much better luck.

The single target damage on engineering for pvp isn't that bad tbh. Have a look at the link in my sig, might help...might not. The issue with lethality is there's a lot of fluff damage if it's not done right.

The single target damage on engineering for pvp isn't that bad tbh. Have a look at the link in my sig, might help...might not. The issue with lethality is there's a lot of fluff damage if it's not done right.

 

Agreed. I find that the single target here is much more significant than Leth. That spec is just DoT spread = lol!

 

If I get the chance to do an actual rotation, this is typically what I do:

 

Interrogation Probe - Corrosive Dart - Plasma Probe - EMP Discharge - Explosive Probe - Series of Shots - Fragmentation Grenade.

 

Of course this rotation will vary incredibly depending on the class you are fighting against. (Typically Mercs/Powertech's Hydraulics pretty much counter the PP, as well as force speed. But if you can get that EMP Stun off, then typically it's GG unless you see Dodge, resilience, or the sorc bubble. Of course there are other counters as well, but these are the most significant. Don't forget the scatter bombs as well. Typically they are better off being used as a defensive measure, but who says you can't have some damage with a defensive CD?

 

Also, R.I.P. scatter bombs. </3

The single target damage on engineering for pvp isn't that bad tbh. Have a look at the link in my sig, might help...might not. The issue with lethality is there's a lot of fluff damage if it's not done right.

 

Just gotta do it right then =P. Ill check out the link tho.

I'll be doing some testing with the Alac builds on the PTS this weekend so I can save the money I have left. I'll try to have some results in by the end of the week assuming all goes well.

Mmk, so I made a thing. I'll attach this to the main thread as well so you guys can track my progress, but anyways, I made a spreadsheet of the builds I'm using. The rotations from each one may vary slightly as I find ways to tweak the rotation, however, these are about 99% similar.

 

I jotted down the APM and Crit % as well on these parses because these heavily influence how good each parse is.

 

So here's the link!

 

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1CAv9Oqm7nBylT3DNFJR5I29-fwdUT8T5jHnGmsxAihE/edit#gid=1290048842

Sorry it's taking me longer than I thought to get the data I need. RL just hit me, so I'm attempting to readjust. I will get this testing done somewhat soon. I hope.

Is it me just having some extreme luck or are the Contingency Charges after the first charge of Smuggler's Luck auto crits as well?

 

So activate smuggler's luck -> Sabotage Charge -> auto crit Contingency Chargers -> Sabotage Charge -> not auto crit Contingency Charges.

Next character I'm getting to 60 is my slinger so I've enjoyed reading your guide here and on Dulfy's site. I don't have anything to add on sab specifically since I'm not even 60 yet but the alacrity argument is interesting to me.

 

I can handle a bit lower dummy DPS because it's the only stat that provides benefit during down time. By that I mean during those times when the boss is immune or you can't be dps'ing for mechanics reasons alacrity still shortens your cooldowns. Maybe this isn't significant enough to matter but it might make sense as you mentioned your actual boss fight DPS has been looking a bit better.

Is it me just having some extreme luck or are the Contingency Charges after the first charge of Smuggler's Luck auto crits as well?

 

So activate smuggler's luck -> Sabotage Charge -> auto crit Contingency Chargers -> Sabotage Charge -> not auto crit Contingency Charges.

 

It's a thing yeah, but I'm still confused about why it's like that. Snipers don't have that little bug that we do. I've addressed to Bioware a couple of times but they haven't said anything about it.

 

Next character I'm getting to 60 is my slinger so I've enjoyed reading your guide here and on Dulfy's site. I don't have anything to add on sab specifically since I'm not even 60 yet but the alacrity argument is interesting to me.

 

I can handle a bit lower dummy DPS because it's the only stat that provides benefit during down time. By that I mean during those times when the boss is immune or you can't be dps'ing for mechanics reasons alacrity still shortens your cooldowns. Maybe this isn't significant enough to matter but it might make sense as you mentioned your actual boss fight DPS has been looking a bit better.

 

It's still under testing, but yeah, I'm surprised it's getting the results I'm receiving.

Edited March 31, 2015 by Camelpockets

Ok so I have some news some of you may be interested in.

 

While I do not have a definite answer on the Alac VS> MS or Power (Final Results will be released by the end of the week for sure. Only one strand of tests left to do. Maybe more if I decide to test power augs as well.)

 

But this is what I've found: Between 740-630 Alacrity rating usually gave me over 39 APM. Roughly 39.5 on average between the two series of tests. However, just 100 points below this value the APM drops by about 1 on average. While this may not seem important at first, take note that there were very minor changes in crit averages between the three. Meaning, the 0.15%(ish) crit obtained from said MS little to no effect on the parses obtained. There are no changes in rotation or gearing (Besides the Alac/MS stated).

 

I'm also busy with stuff outside of SWTOR so I'm rushing to some conclusion, but the startilization of the APM difference from 640 to 536 hit me like a train. There shouldn't be big differences between the two, yet it happens.

 

TL;DR: If you are running a high Alacrity build, run between 740-640. Do NOT run below this if you want to reap the full benefits of alacrity.

Edited April 5, 2015 by Camelpockets

Perhaps the lazyness factor has officially set in, but the data suggests that at my current critical rating (302) these is virtually no difference in DPS between the 120 approx. alacrity rating build and the 740-640 builds.

 

Overall Conclusion:

After doing a review of a couple of parses, I'm going point out here a couple of things to keep in mind as you start gearing.

 

If you have lag based off PERFORMANCE I recommend not using the high alacrity build. Put in one enhancement and you are good to go. This is because physical input time is being affected, not internal input time.

 

If you have lag based off INTERNET/CONNECTIVITY, you could actually do either/or. Explanation: Typically everyone experiences sever lag from time to time. Its unavoidable. But EVERYONE has ping. Whether it is good or bad, it doesn't actually matter when it comes to alacrity. Let's attempt to look at this mathematically shall we?

 

So our standard GCD timer is 1.5 seconds. Good to know if you don't. People have X ping all the time on SWTOR. Not everyone has great ping, but not everyone has horrible ping either. For simplicity's sake, let's just say we have 100ms ping. And this is in regards to input. So if we use Flurry of Bolts at 0 time, then it'll actually be used .1 seconds after we physically clicked it, then the GCD would come off 1.6 seconds after click.

 

Now let's take our new Alac build and so some math. With the 740 rating we reach about 8.5% Alacrity, which reduces the GCD timer by .1275 seconds. Our new GCD timer becomes 1.3725 seconds. Now if we account for that .1 seconds of ping we'll achieve an actual GCD clock of 1.4725 roughly. This puts it back under the normal GCD timer if ping is at this level.

 

Now that we have both timers accounted for ping lets do some more math. By doing [1-(1.5/1.6)] and [1-(1.3725/1.4725)], we can see what % the ping is slowing down the GCD clock, on average. In standard we are losing about 6.25% of potential uptime. With the new Alac build, we are losing 6.78% of potential uptime. That is only a .5% difference between low and high alac builds at 100ms ping. In raids this percentage will raise by a small fraction depending on the quality of your computer.

 

So what does this all mean?: The % of time lost by adding more alacrity into the mix will go unnoticed in a raid. Meaning even someone with semi-quality ping one can still do optimal dps with higher alacrity.

 

Now to note the differences between the two:

 

Low alacrity - This will have generally better looking numbers at the beginning of a parse. Since the full effect of alacrity doesn't kick in at the very beginning, full Power or MS augs will produce better opening numbers. Meaning, in a raid scenario, this build would be most optimal for bosses with lower hp, or a series of burn phases.

 

High alacrity - While slightly weaker in the opener, the full effects of Alacrity really kick in after about 3 minutes into any fight. Since overall TTK is being reduced strictly by speed, the speed will surpass the damage dealt throughout a low - alacrity build on prolonged fights. This build will be particularly useful on fights with small adds or with a constant need to switch targets. And of course longer boss fights.

 

Tl;DR: Pick what you feel you'd like to do. The dps difference is minimal between the two. Each set has their own advantages, but both can perform almost equally well in raids. Just don't do high alacrity if you can't keep up with the speed increase.

 

I will be running high-alacrity because Camel doesn't like to disappoint. Also, if my techy **** is off, let me know. I just went off of some very generic **** knowledge of ping. Don't actually know the full effects of ping

Edited April 5, 2015 by Camelpockets

Regarding the alacrity vs mainstat augments. My own theorycrafting suggests a very very tiny difference. Based on a DPS output of 4.500 you would see a dps loss of about 35 dps when using 12 augs

 

The moral in here is that it doesn't really matter which augment you take. Both are about equal.

 

Please note that I use a 0.9 factor for alacrity

Yay! This thread was stickied!

 

Appreciate it BW

Someone get the anti adhesive.

I'm glad you put this guide out. I've been trying to get back into my sniper, and playing around with Engineering. Your work is much appreciated:D

I'm glad you put this guide out. I've been trying to get back into my sniper, and playing around with Engineering. Your work is much appreciated:D

 

Yay <3

Hey Camels, I have a sniper as my second dps, and I don't theory craft to much on her, but I use 5 198 enh/ear/impl and three accuracy augment (99.99% accuracy) and have two to three surge enhancements, and two to three alacrity enhancements, and the rest of the augs as MS, and with about a third 198 and two thirds 192 bis stuff, my average parse last night was around 4850. I know on Nohvia (IO merc) I have a similer set up, but once I had most 198 mods and left side, I switched an augment or two to alacrity for bis dps. I may get to it more, but either way, thanks for the guide and showing BC is the best!

Hey Camels, I have a sniper as my second dps, and I don't theory craft to much on her, but I use 5 198 enh/ear/impl and three accuracy augment (99.99% accuracy) and have two to three surge enhancements, and two to three alacrity enhancements, and the rest of the augs as MS, and with about a third 198 and two thirds 192 bis stuff, my average parse last night was around 4850. I know on Nohvia (IO merc) I have a similer set up, but once I had most 198 mods and left side, I switched an augment or two to alacrity for bis dps. I may get to it more, but either way, thanks for the guide and showing BC is the best!

 

My only slight recommendation is to make sure you are running with 3 surge enhancements. That 69% surge is incredibly valuable.

 

BC too OP!

Edited April 17, 2015 by Camelpockets

Thanks for the guide! This spec is the only reason I really like sniper now (besides having cool downs...that's nice). Now I just have to get my tanks to stop pulling adds out of aoes on commanders.../twitches

Thanks for the guide! This spec is the only reason I really like sniper now (besides having cool downs...that's nice). Now I just have to get my tanks to stop pulling adds out of aoes on commanders.../twitches

 

The pains of engineering...

 

" YOU DICK!!!!! :mad: STAHP PULLING THE BOSS OUT OF THE AOESSSSSS :mad::eek:"

The pains of engineering...

 

" YOU DICK!!!!! :mad: STAHP PULLING THE BOSS OUT OF THE AOESSSSSS :mad::eek:"

 

lol ya, they do it when it's not even needed. The melee really aren't happy either

So I have a question. After perusing your guide here, I see you have a vastly different rotation than the one on dulfy.

 

 

 

 

vs Dulfy Rotation

 

Is the former rotation(s) what you would use in a raid fight? If so, what do you use in place of covered escape, as that does not seem to have a lot of applications, even if you can rollbang...not sure if you can still. Or the latter rotation?

 

Edit: I assume you use thermal grenade, but I can't parse right now. Are those the definite rotations, and the one on dulfy now obsolete? Thanks.

Edited April 25, 2015 by Hockaday