Your Surge and Crit are a bit high and your accuracy is low. You really want your accuracy at 100% and preferably at 104% so you do not miss offhand ticks. Your opener should be TM, the faster it stacks the better. Unload should only be used on proc. Consider some of the newer 6/31/4 or 7/31/3 builds that work Alacrity into the mix. I believe in testing it takes you from 26 activations per minute (APM) to 32 APM, which is a significant increase in DPS. 7/31/3 Alacrity Build. http://swtor.askmrrobot.com/skills/mercenary#2032-1f76d26e7le-d 6/31/4 Alacrity Build (experimental) http://swtor.askmrrobot.com/skills/mercenary#1032-1f76d26e7le-9

Umm this is exactly why Power Shot is part of the priority rotation, because you WANT to be using Rail Shot every six seconds. Think of it like this, what is the cooldown of Rail Shot if you did not use Power Shot. If you get a proc on the first Unload, then you get one free Rail Shot, after that it is no faster than one Rail shot every fifteen seconds. Kind of a waste of three talent points, eh? Use Power Shot, even in PVP, if you can't/won't then you need to rethink your spec.

Because everything that Arsenal does is tied to spamming TM. A four second lockout is enough to invalidate you for whatever time it takes for them to take you out or to prevent you from doing your job in whatever map you are in. Since every class but Merc/Commando has an interrupt they can just take turns which I have seen done with my own team before. We call out the Merc Interrupt Order just for fun against bads in RWZ who insist on bringing an Arsenal, then take turns interrupting them. Sure you can make it work in a stellar team if you are at the absolute top of your game, with the best gear, and have a team willing to carry you, but the best you can hope for is that you will not hurt the team. As for Pyro things work a little differently since about 30-40% of our damage in WZ is burns. Not to mention if Unload is going to proc Rail Shot it does it at activation, not completion, meaning if Unload gets interrupted we still get our free Rail Shot. Losing Power Shot to an interrupt is annoying, but it is at the bottom end of our priority rotation. An Arsenal Rotation would look like this: Is Unload on cooldown? No, Unload. Yes? Does target have five stacks of Heat Signature? No, TM. Yes? Is HSM on cooldown? No, HSM. Yes? Do you have five stacks of Target Lock? No, TM. Yes? Is Rail Shot on cooldown? No, Rail Shot. Yes? Are you at 50 heat or less? No, Rapid Shots. Yes? TM This is how Pyro looks: Is the target burning? No, Incendiary Missile. Yes? Is Rail Shot on cooldown? No, Rail Shot. Yes? Is TD on cooldown? No, TD. Yes? Is Unload on Cooldown? No, Unload and cancel if Rail Shot procs. Yes? Are you at 50 heat or less? No, Rapid Shots. Yes? Can you stand still for a GCD? No, Rapid Shots. Yes? Power Shot. You can see the problem that Arsenal has here, if TM ever goes on cooldown, their priority rotation is screwed. If Power Shot goes on cooldown, it is annoying but it is only used at the bottom of the priority list. I need to make up some flow charts for this to explain it better.

Currently no matter what Power Augments are already about .002% better than Aim Augments even taking Crit into account. This is due to various talents and abilities increasing damage or doing other things on Crits. Aim adds to the "Critical Rating" we have, it does not directly add to Crit %. This means once diminishing returns are hit we gain little or nothing from Aim in terms of improved Critical %. At this point Power Augments become a lot better than Aim Augments. You are right in that if you are hitting diminishing returns with Aim Augments, then you should be moving stuff around. From my experience this is really hard to do overall since the best gear is a little short on Crit.

Until something can protect you from lockout interrupts Arsenal is not viable in any serious pvp capacity. In Ranked WZs, a Sage or GS will be assigned to keep your TM on perma cooldown and you'll spend a whole lot of time being ignored.

Any game where my team is so bad that 600k+ damage gets done by anyone then I will be up there with them. As I am on vacation this week, this will have to wait until I get back. However I will say that I do not think I have topped 525k in a RWZ yet, 600k is entirely possible if everyone else is bad but the healers in a normal pugged WZ. Damage numbers are usually lower for everyone in RWZ for several different reasons, better protection, better movement, better communication, and far more objective oriented play. I have WZ where I get 150k and others where I am at or close to 500k, but I am always in the top one or two for the WZ unless I get stuck babysitting an ignored node. That rarely happens as we will shuffle people to put the DPS where they can do the most good. Huge numbers on a scorecard means your team is in a bad match up, not that there is a problem with the class.

Speaking only about PVP. Why would you move when it is not in your or your team's best interest for you to move? Why ignore one of our hardest hitting abilities when you can actually use it effectively. I understand that we need to be mobile, but not to the point of ignoring important abilities. Priority should look something like this: Is the target burning? No, Incendiary Missile. Yes? Is Rail Shot on cooldown? No, Rail Shot. Yes? Is Thermal Detonator on cooldown? No, TD. Yes? Is Unload on cooldown? No, Unload and cancel if Rail Shot procs. Yes? Is heat under 50? No, Rapid Shots. Yes? Can you stand still for a GCD? No, Rapid Shots. Yes? Power Shot. This should have you using Power Shot at least two or three times every fifteen second rotation period. Which you need to be doing in order to get Rail Shot procs. Pyro a lot more mobile than Arsenal, but it does not have the ability to be supremely mobile and retain all of its dps capability. As for Infrared Sensors, the benefit of Stealth Scan is usually fairly predictable and it is rarely on cooldown when we need to use it. Plus we have other ways of clearing stealth if need be, Sweeping Blasters, Jet Boost, DFA, etc. I would rather be able to cast through an AE or melee tickle when I need to, than get 1% endurance and shortened cooldown on a situational ability.

Getting Deadly Cannon fixed is going to require a campaign. We need actual logs showing it doesn't work in 1.3. Easiest say to test this is to get an empty Orange Cannon, strip naked, and only have talents up to Grav Round. Do nothing but Full Auto for 10 minutes. Every 15 seconds, Full Auto on a dummy. Then put two points into Deadly Cannon and do it again for 10 minutes. Screenshot and video both tests and results. Then spam every single relevant board here until they acknowledge the problem.

If I am ranged, I need to be able to cast Power Shot without every random AE or melee tickle causing me to lose time on the induction. I will gladly trade 1% endurance and worthless Infrared Sensors for the ability to cast/channel without pushback. I tested it without going with another 3% Crit, was worth it in PVE not in PVP.

Hogwash, no Assault Vanguard or PT has ever doubled me up in any WZ rated or non. If anything their advantage lies entirely in the matter of utility. They obtain, protect, and manage objectives better than we do, and they have a better game against heavy armor classes. We have range while they have to be in melee to do the most damage. Twice as good? BS, the advantage is maybe 5% for Assault Vanguards against Commandos head to head. My team will not ask me to reroll, that would be insane since it would take over a month to level and gear up with no guarantee that I would be able to play Vanguard as well as I play Commando. It is over reactions and embellishments like this that mask the real problems Commandos have.

Yeah there is a huge difference between Recruit gear and fully Augmented WH gear. Good news is that BM gear is cheap, only takes a few days to get geared up, and is pretty good. Take your lumps, pay your dues. =)

Personally I do not want another button to press, would greatly prefer that they change an existing ability or talent. Pinning Fire seems like a perfect place to put it. High enough up the tree to prevent hybrid builds and strong enough to have a real impact in PVP and add some PVE usability. I would like Sticky Grenade to get a root component from a Deep Gunnery talent, but that would require re-balancing the tree.

This link should give you a good framework. Specific numbers are mentioned in the threat at various points. http://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/1117292-Arsenal-Bounty-Hunter-Are-YOU-Doing-It-Right

That would make it exactly the same as the sage/sorcerer talent, and they seem to frown upon exact duplicates. I think a better idea would be to change Pinning Fire from a snare to a root, which by itself would solve a lot of problems. Minimal Change, no need to change gear or rebalance abilities, just a simple change.

Just respec Assault for PVP, I know it's a PITA but I do not see them fixing Gunnery anytime soon. Even then the changes would have to be fairly minor in order to keep it in line with their damage potential.