Evaluating PvP gear for 1.2

Soon the patch will be upon us and we will be trading out our Battle Master gear for the brand new War Hero Set. The new gear is clearly an upgrade to the current gear we can obtain and it retains the same set bonuses so you don't have to worry about losing your 15% Rail Shot critical bonus.

Non Rated War Hero Eliminators Set

However 1.2 also brings crafters the ability to critically craft custom gear. So what does this mean for us Bounty Hunters?
Well when you critically craft a piece of gear it has a chance to obtain an Augment slot allowing for the addition of an Augment. With 1.2 allowing us to pull the Armor mods out of the War Hero gear in addition to the set bonuses it carries, we can place them in critically crafted custom gear along with Augments for better stats.

So basically in order to compete with everyone else we will have to use this custom gear with the mods from the new War Hero gear along with Augments in each slot. While this does give us a bit more customization options I fear that all the effort the game artists put into our awesome looking War Hero set will be for nothing because we're all going to be running around in level 30 something armor.

Fully geared Rank 1 War Hero

So for now start getting your credits ready, the best looking pieces will surely sell for the highest. And remember if your wearing the actual War Hero gear, your doing it wrong.

Have fun collecting the best looking Bounty Hunter gear. And please no more slave girl outfits, that does not belong on the most feared Bounty Hunter in the galaxy.

Prototype Particle Accelerator

According to the latest patch notes the staple talent of the Pyrotech tree Prototype Particle Accelerator (PPA) has been heavily reduced. However the chance to proc has been increased by 15% for all abilities that could previously proc it.

• Unload 75%
• Power Shot 45%
• Rocket Punch* 60%
• Flame Burst* 45%

* (Powertech abilities of the same talent placed in the list for comparison)

The big change is that now you can only Proc PPA once every 6 Seconds. Obviously this is a change to the burst nature of the talent where you could get several Rail Shots off in a row by getting lucky with Power Shot and Unload. The Powertech version was quite a bit stronger with all their proc abilities being instant.

Now we should get more consistent procs but less Procs overall. The problem with the change is it does lower the burst damage but it hurts the heat regulation system of Pyrotech with Superheated Rail venting heat on each Rail Shot fired from the proc of PPA while also lowering the overall damage of Pyrotech for both specs by a considerable amount.

Now I can't really say that our damage is in line with other classes as my only way to measure it is via Warzone Scoreboards. Based on that it shows that I am usually on top or near the top of the damage meter. So if the goal of the change here is to reduce the damage that Pyrotechs are capable of, it has succeeded.

I propose something else should be done with the talent than just reducing the proc rate and increasing the proc chance.

Instead of just making PPA proc far less than what it is now I propose a new system be put into place. Simply change the nature of PPA.

The new talent would read something like.

So basically instead of relying on some gimmicky proc that may or may not happen 6 seconds after the last time it happened we switch to a system that reliably lets you reduce the heat cost of Rail Shot and its cooldown in a manner that reduces the burst of the talent and maintains steady heat management.

I think this is a superior system and I would prefer it over what we are currently going to get in 1.2.

Patch 1.2 Bounty Hunter changes

The patch notes are up for the Player Test Server for patch 1.2. I took the liberty of coping the relevant ones here and editing them a bit so you can see the changes made to the different abilities. All the relevant changes have been highlighted in yellow. So far it looks to be an overall nerf to Bounty Hunter damage. But its not so earth shattering as the Sorcerer changes.

General

• Ability Heat costs are now displayed in skill tree and trainer windows.
• Death From Above now has a 5-meter radius (down from 10) to bring its range in line with other Bounty Hunter Area of Effect abilities and it now begins dealing damage sooner after activation.
• Hydraulic Overrides now has improved audio and visual effects.
• Incendiary Missile audio has been improved.

Mercenary

• Cure now generates 8 Heat (down from 16). Jet Boost now triggers snare visual effects on affected targets. Power Shot has been rebalanced. It now generates 16 Heat, has a 2-second activation time, and deals approximately 10% less damage. Tracer Missile and Fusion Missile's animations have been exchanged by popular demand from the community

Cure is now cheaper to use. Power Shot loses 10% of its power but the heat and cast time remains the same.

The change to Tracer Missile is interesting. Seems like Fusion Missile fits more as the bad ass missile you'd want to shoot from your back.

Arsenal

• Barrage: the chance to trigger this effect has been increased significantly.
• Heatseeker Missiles' damage output has been increased by approximately 10%.
• Jet Escape now reduces the cooldown of Jet Boost by 2.5 (down from 5) seconds per point.
• Muzzle Fluting no longer reduces Heat costs. It now reduces the activation time of Power Shot and Tracer Missile by .5 seconds.
• Power Barrier now provides 1% (down from 2%) damage reduction per stack.
• Tracer Missile has been rebalanced in order to encourage more active game play rotations. It now generates 16 Heat (down from 25), has a 2-second (up from 1.5) activation time, and deals approximately 10% less damage.

The net change in Arsenal is that Tracer Missile now deals less damage but Heat Seeker Missile deals more damage and Barrage is more likely to proc.

Bodyguard

• Critical Efficiency now reduces the cost of Rapid Scan by 8 (down from 16).
• Cure Mind no longer reduces the cost of Cure. It now causes Cure to heal the target for a small amount.
• Hired Muscle now increases critical chance by 1% (down from 2%) per point.
• Kolto Missile now affects up to 4 targets (up from 3), improving reliability in group and Operation situations.
• Kolto Residue now increases all healing received by 3% (down from 5%).
• Kolto Shell now builds 16 Heat when activated.
• Supercharged Gas now vents 8 Heat (down from 16) when used and increases all damage and healing dealt by 5% (down from 10%).
• The shield applied by Kolto Missile now reduces damage taken by 5% (down from 10%).

I don't really know enough about Bodyguard to comment on the changes effectively, but this looks like quite a power decrease. The change to Hired Muscle hurts all the specs though.

Pyrotech (Mercenary)

• Prototype Particle Accelerator now requires Combustible Gas Cylinder to trigger. The chance to trigger this effect has been increased significantly but cannot trigger more than once every 6 seconds. (All abilities that can proc have had their chance increased by 15%)

This could be an interesting change to the rotation of Pyrotech. The cylinder choice is no longer and option and depending on the proc rate this could be a good change or a terrible one.

Hopefully I can get on the PTS to test and provide more information soon. Don't be discouraged by a few changes, we're still the best class in the game.

Super Fusion Missile

Today I'd like to discuss one of my favorite little moves to really put some hurt on someone your trying to kill. You see Bounty Hunters don't really have abilities that directly increase our damage for a short time. Instead we have the ability to burst someone by going beyond our normal heat levels.

Sometimes though you just need to put out a lot of damage really quickly and this little combo of abilities really helps.

First off you want to load up your two prerequisite buff skills, Thermal Sensor Override and Power Surge. Then use those to buffs to freely cast Fusion Missile and do a ton of damage for Zero Heat and only one cast.

While it does seem like a simple maneuver to execute, the Super Fusion Missile (SFM) can deal a significant amount of damage due to Fusion Missile being the highest damage per Cast ability in the Mercenary toolkit. The damage it does is offset by the absurd 33 Heat cost.

Super Fusion Missile (SFM)

So using Thermal Sensor Override to make this particular skill free allows us to use each Thermal Sensor Override as a damage increasing cooldown.

Also SFM benefits from Firebug and Burnout making it an excellent execution type move to finish off enemy targets below 30% health.

If your like me though nothing is more satisfying than setting people on fire, and SFM is the perfect way to do that.

Choosing the Right Weapon Cylinder

Choosing a Cylinder seems easy at first. High Velocity Gas Cylinder for Arsenal and Combustible Gas Cylinder for Pyrotech.

The talents in each tree seem to support that as well.

Arsenal has Terminal Velocity which benefits their barrage of missile attacks. Pyrotech has Superheated Gas which increases the proc rate of Combustible Gas Cylinder. It also gains the effects of Firebug and Burnout which increases the damage when it procs.

While its clear the Arsenal is better off using High Velocity Gas Cylinder its not so clear with Pyrotech.

In order to decide we'll have to calculate how much damage per second Combustible Gas Cylinder actually contributes compared to how much damage High Velocity Gas Cylinder adds to each attack.

Using my current gear set of Full champion gear with some Battle Master gear I came up with these averages for my ranged attacks.

• Rapid Shots   - 914 Damage
• Power Shot    - 1920 Damage
• Unload        - 955 Damage
• Rail Shot     - 1584 Damage 

Modified by 25% armor which would be about 5% less than a Bounty Hunter and 5% more than a Sorcerer.

• Rapid Shots   - 685 Damage
• Power Shot    - 1440 Damage
• Unload        - 716 Damage
• Rail Shot     - 1298 Damage*

*Rail Shot gains 30% Armor Penetration when used on a Burning Target.

High Velocity Gas Cylinder allows us to ignore 35% of the targets Armor. All of our Ranged attacks and Thermal Detonator benefit from this increased Armor Penetration.

So calculating the average damage of these attacks with the added Armor Penetration.

• Rapid Shots   - 767 Damage ^83
• Power Shot    - 1613 Damage ^173
• Unload        - 802 Damage ^86
• Rail Shot     - 1441 Damage* ^143

*Rail Shot gains 65% Armor Penetration when used on a Burning Target combined with High Velocity Gas Cylinder.

The average damage gain for Ranged attacks using High Velocity Gas Cylinder is about 11%

Now lets compare that to Combustible Gas Cylinder.

We know it can proc off all Ranged attacks which includes Rapid Shots, Unload, Power Shot, and Rail Shot.

Each time it procs it deals 1168 Elemental Damage.

With a 16% chance to proc modified by Talents, your looking at about 187 Damage per Second provided by the proc.

So to put that in the equation the average damage of each attack would be.

• Rapid Shots   - 872 Damage +187
• Power Shot    - 1627 Damage +187
• Unload        - 903 Damage +187
• Rail Shot     - 1485 Damage* +187

*Rail Shot gains 30% Armor Penetration when used on a Burning Target.

On the hardest hitting attacks your seeing an average of 11% increased damage and on the lowest damage attacks you get an average of 21% damage increase.

This totals to 16% increased damage from Combustible Gas Cylinder.

For comparison High Velocity Gas Cylinder is around 11% increased damage.


So for sustained damage Combustible Gas Cylinder is the clear winner by a margin of around 5%.

However on high armor targets such as Tanks that have around 40% armor the benefit of High Velocity Gas Cylinder jumps to around 22%.

So all in all Combustible Gas Cylinder does more damage over a longer period and provides a static boost of around 16%, however because it is a proc effect you aren't always guaranteed to get that damage.

High Velocity Gas Cylinder is more reliable with around 22% increased damage on high armor targets (Tanks) and 8% increase on lower armor targets. (Sages)

In Summary.

1.  Use High Velocity Gas Cylinder for:
1. Tanks
2. More Burst Damage
3. People that can Cleanse your Combustible Gas Cylinder
2. Use Combustible Gas Cylinder for:
1. Lower Armor Targets
2. Sustained Damage
3. High Heat situations.

Hope this helps you decide.


All Calculations were done using the average damage of each attack without factoring critical strike into the equations.

High Score

After extensive testing I can say without a doubt that Pyrotech is much better than Arsenal in PvP.

The reason being is you have more burst damage, and you still do decent damage while moving. Obviously it isn't as easy as Arsenal Spec, but the burst is much higher.

In PvP all your kills are usually going to be attributed to bursting someone down before they can flee and heal up. Since most people use their cooldowns when they are below 50% health you can take advantage of this and wait until you have them at 70% or so then blow them up.

Of course it still stands that Arsenal is superior in PvE, killing the same bosses over and over again isn't as exciting as killing people in Warzones.

So right now my Record for Huttball is 500000. Lets see if I can beat that when I'm full Battle Master.

Tooltips

Finally found a way to add dynamic tooltips to the site, so it should be easier to see more information about the abilities.