Heya, I've been snooping around and I've found out this tidbit of information:

 

3. Primary Stats

 

There are five primary/basic character attributes in SWTOR: Endurance, Aim, Cunning, Strength and Willpower. Endurance gives you 10 HP per single point, and the other four stats increase your class’ base damage and critical chance:

 

All primary stats give 1% crit for every 140 (at level 50)

Aim gives 0.2 ranged damage

Strength gives 0.2 melee damage

Cunning gives 0.2 tech damage

Will power gives 0.2 force damage

 

Your primary stat will always give either [Ranged + Tech] or [Melee + Force], so a Trooper will get a tech bonus from Cunning, and a Smuggler will get a ranged damage bonus from Aim in addition to the bonuses they already get from their primary stat. This causes Smugglers to do more damage with Weapon attacks, and Troopers will do more damage with Tech attacks (see: explosives) assuming both had the same base value and scaling. Strength and Willpower give both of them nothing but crit.

 

Source: http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=53189

 

After reading that, and seeing that most of a Gunslinger's high-damage attacks are labeled with "Ranged"...wouldn't it be more beneficial (although a pain) to gear out an Aim-Gunnslinger? (Marksman/Dirty Fighting of course).

 

Theoretically, we'd lose Tech Power (which applies to sabotage charge, XS Bombardment, grenades, etc) for more damage on Aimed Shot/Speed Shot/Wounding Shots/Charged Burst/etc.

 

Does Aim not amplify our attacks? Or is there a detail I'm missing?

Edited October 7, 2012 by Lexlo

Cunning gives the ranged damage bonus for Smugglers/agents too

Cunning gives the ranged damage bonus for Smugglers/agents too

 

Ahh, it appears that detail was left out of the post or the post is outdated.

 

Thanks.

There is a detail your missing cuning is needed for Smugglers regardless of what advanced class you are. This applies to Imperial Agents as well. The stat Cunning affects EVERYTHING you do. Cunning is what determines the amount of damage you do as well as how good the MAJORITY of your skills will do against opponents. I will not deny that Aim is important because Smugglers are primarly ranged fighters, however for Smugglers Cunning is the MOST important stat you need in order to be successful in the game. I tried the Gunslinger setup you suggested and it was an complete failure.

The answer to your question is yes cunning is really useful. This stat affects EVERYTHING you do as well as adding major benefits to ALL your skills as a Smuggler regardless of being either Scoundrel or Gunslinger. Yes Aim is important for Gunslingers but it is not the most important stat a smuggler needs.

side note picking up aim datacrons is a good idea. While cunning is the primary and increases everything, increasing you're aim does also increase your ranged non tech attacks.

hover your cursor over each stat in your character pane and see the description of what it does. Then decide whether or not you think a smuggler needs cunning... and why they don't need aim.

 

Tooltips are your friends, people that post nonsense because they don't use them are not.

side note picking up aim datacrons is a good idea. While cunning is the primary and increases everything, increasing you're aim does also increase your ranged non tech attacks.

yeah, i think the important takeaway from this discussion is that aim is useful for a gunslinger, but cunning is clearly better.

 

basically, get as much aim as you can from datacrons, and you should see a decent improvement, but don't EVER get aim on gear.

Edited October 15, 2012 by oaceen

Cunning is the best stat for a GS. Augment all your gear with cunning at 50. I rock a warlord GS now 1902 cunning with biochem stim, and my personal consular buff. PvE wise I think I am 2340ish.

 

In either set of gear pvp or pve I have cunning augs on every item. On both sets, my tech crit is at 40% my ranged crit is at 41% because of Aim. Surge about 78% in pve 79% pvp.

 

You can min max much easier just stacking cunning. It frees you up for power surge since your crit ratting just keeps going up. So just stick with cunning you will be fine.

Edited October 25, 2012 by TonyBuss

cunning is the most useful stat in the beginning.

from what I've read from theorycrafters it falls behind power at some point (that point when the crit component of cunning becomes victim of diminishing returns so much, that cunnings worth is only for power and then power will provide more bang for your buck )

cunning is the most useful stat in the beginning.

from what I've read from theorycrafters it falls behind power at some point (that point when the crit component of cunning becomes victim of diminishing returns so much, that cunnings worth is only for power and then power will provide more bang for your buck )

You must've read some wrong theoycrafting. Crit from Crit Rating does have dimishing returns starting quite fast. However, crit from Cunning is much more linear (you need smth like 10000+ Cunning to feel diminishing returns). Counting added crit chance, damage from Cunning will be always better than from Power.