Theorycrafting spreadsheet for 2.0 balance sage

[Stoofa]

So what should we be really concentrating on with regards secondary stats?

With my pre 2.0 TK Sage it was already:

Alacrity > Surge > Critical

 

Are we now having to add some accuracy in there as well? And if so, at the expense of what?

[Nibbon]

So what should we be really concentrating on with regards secondary stats?

With my pre 2.0 TK Sage it was already:

Alacrity > Surge > Critical

 

Are we now having to add some accuracy in there as well? And if so, at the expense of what?

 

Crit is not on the same line as alacrity and surge (and accuracy)

 

so it is power > crit

and accuracy > surge > alacrity

 

TK has some auto crit, and you'll find your overall crit percentage is close to 30% with the right spec. Surge is still one of the best curves in the game in terms of diminishing returns and I already explained my thoughts on alacrity in my previous post. Accuracy, there really is no question, you need 5 mods at minimum against boss mobs (where you have a 10% miss chance - 4% will come from your spec and companion affection) each mod is about 1% - so the optimal amount is between 99%-100% hit/miss. That leaves room for only 4 more enhancements, and as I've mentioned, I think 4 surge is probably the best - leaving 0 alacrity.

 

I'll reiterate again here, I think the optimal gearing situation is:

-6 accuracy, 4 surge, 0 alacrity --- all power (no crit) -- all willpower augments

-I believe you could trade up to 3 surge for 3 alacrity without losing out on too much DPS and I believe you should do so based on personal preference

-I don't use TK, I use balance and everything here is based off a fairly static spreadsheet - albeit one I spent a lot of time on.

[renoxodus]

Great work! Thanks for all you do!

[Skaol-dirtyd]

For Balance?

 

WM --> FiB --> SF --> TT --> MC (off proc) --> TT --> disturbance (conditional)

 

From there - it is FiB off cooldown, keep WM and SF up always, usually you can put in one disturbance before you need to refresh WM - I typically only cast one disturbance even if it procs again because one disturbance will make it so your TT doesn't run past when you need to refresh your dots - and so you will more likely have the proc up again for MC.

 

Just curious why you go FiB before SF ?

Edited April 10, 2013 by Skaol-dirtyd

[Nibbon]

Just curious why you go FiB before SF ?

 

SF first tick is upon application (like a direct damage attack such as project). You want to hit as many of your WM and SF ticks on top of your FiB force suppression as possible). With the GCD you should be able to cast your WM, apply force suppression through FiB, and then cast SF before your first WM tick hits (around 3 seconds).

 

So for the actual reasoning, there are three:

1. You want to cast as many FiB as humanly possible

2. You want to have as many of your WM and SF (essentially Non-mind crush ticks) to hit your suppression as possible - and by casting SF after you are getting that initial hit

3. When you pop cooldowns (And I like to do this right before I cast FiB) you have the added benefit of your adrenal and power relic for extra damage on the SF.

 

These are actually all really minor reasons and I haven't seen much of a difference to go either way, but those are my reasons

[Skaol-dirtyd]

SF first tick is upon application (like a direct damage attack such as project). You want to hit as many of your WM and SF ticks on top of your FiB force suppression as possible). With the GCD you should be able to cast your WM, apply force suppression through FiB, and then cast SF before your first WM tick hits (around 3 seconds).

 

So for the actual reasoning, there are three:

1. You want to cast as many FiB as humanly possible

2. You want to have as many of your WM and SF (essentially Non-mind crush ticks) to hit your suppression as possible - and by casting SF after you are getting that initial hit

3. When you pop cooldowns (And I like to do this right before I cast FiB) you have the added benefit of your adrenal and power relic for extra damage on the SF.

 

These are actually all really minor reasons and I haven't seen much of a difference to go either way, but those are my reasons

 

Makes sense. I was not taking into account the Force Suppression. I was simply thinking of getting the dots up and running as fast as possible.

 

Thanks for the info.... good stuff

[Hakkology]

I can help with that a bit - although my spreadsheet shows 0 alacrity for TK, that might not be the case. The truth is the difference in surge and alacrity is very small in 2.0 (the curves are just so flattened and shrunk percentage wise, that the actual gains from them aren't much is part of the reason). So, in fact, if you find that you prefer having faster casts and they end up better aligning with ... whatever ... than I would highly encourage you to find your own balance. My spreadsheet is a hypothetical "perfect" casting situation, where you do not move, you have no downtime, and you are chain casting perfectly - usually not the case.

 

All that being said, you should not mistake Cooldown with Global Cooldown. Alacrity does NOT effect cooldowns. So if your cooldown for mental alacrity, with all the buffs and such, is 1 minute 30 seconds, having 0 or 500 alacrity will not make that number go up or down any. If alacrity effected cooldowns, it would be overpoweringly useful (more turbulence casts, for example). This is a large reason why alacrity still isn't that good, though. Alacrity is only really useful when you have lots of casting abilities - which is why I'd theorize that alacrity is great for healing.

 

Thanks for the response.

 

You are correct, i now see the fail of my logic. I'm about to go cap accuracy and test some dps on dummy soon.

[Larry_Dallas]

Question for you guys: Lightning sorc who's not quite sure where to put the last two points: Force Gift, Critical Kinesis or even Drain thoughts (not out of the question with the double ticks on mind crush this skill might be pretty useful for TK now).

 

Any ideas?

[Nibbon]

Question for you guys: Lightning sorc who's not quite sure where to put the last two points: Force Gift, Critical Kinesis or even Drain thoughts (not out of the question with the double ticks on mind crush this skill might be pretty useful for TK now).

 

Any ideas?

 

Well if you had to chose between just those three, I'd probably go critical kinesis.

 

But, if you had points in penetrating light I'd put those into force gift.

 

I may have linked this earlier in the thread, but I believe this is the TK spec I found was the highest on the spreadsheet: http://www.swtor-spy.com/skill-tree-calculator/jedi-sage/19/?build=210000000000000000000000000000000323022202120210023001020230001003020002000000000000000000000000&ver=20

[Larry_Dallas]

Well if you had to chose between just those three, I'd probably go critical kinesis.

 

But, if you had points in penetrating light I'd put those into force gift.

 

I may have linked this earlier in the thread, but I believe this is the TK spec I found was the highest on the spreadsheet: http://www.swtor-spy.com/skill-tree-calculator/jedi-sage/19/?build=210000000000000000000000000000000323022202120210023001020230001003020002000000000000000000000000&ver=20

 

Hmmm. Isn't psychic projection going to take longer to proc that way? And won't this problem just compound the longer the fight goes?

[Nibbon]

Hmmm. Isn't psychic projection going to take longer to proc that way? And won't this problem just compound the longer the fight goes?

 

It won't compound ... you will still basically average 3+ procs a minute - this will give you a 20% proc chance instead of 22% - obviously that is 10% better of a chance (per tick). You'd have to do a distribution curve to see the actual effect, but if you do, and you average it, then you will get this:

the difference in a chance of proc (so basically a WM crit) on the first tick is: 20% at 20% and 22% at 22%

by the second tick: 36% and 39.6%

it ultimately looks like this

tick crit on cumulative crit on cumulative difference

1 20.00% 20.00% 22.00% 22.00% 2.00%

2 16.00% 36.00% 17.16% 39.16% 3.16%

3 12.80% 48.80% 13.38% 52.54% 3.74%

4 10.24% 59.04% 10.44% 62.98% 3.94%

5 8.19% 67.23% 8.14% 71.13% 3.90%

6 6.55% 73.79% 6.35% 77.48% 3.69%

7 5.24% 79.03% 4.95% 82.43% 3.41%

8 4.19% 83.22% 3.86% 86.30% 3.08%

9 3.36% 86.58% 3.01% 89.31% 2.73%

10 2.68% 89.26% 2.35% 91.66% 2.40%

11 2.15% 91.41% 1.83% 93.50% 2.09%

12 1.72% 93.13% 1.43% 94.93% 1.80%

13 1.37% 94.50% 1.12% 96.04% 1.54%

14 1.10% 95.60% 0.87% 96.91% 1.31%

15 0.88% 96.48% 0.68% 97.59% 1.11%

16 0.70% 97.19% 0.53% 98.12% 0.94%

17 0.56% 97.75% 0.41% 98.54% 0.79%

18 0.45% 98.20% 0.32% 98.86% 0.66%

19 0.36% 98.56% 0.25% 99.11% 0.55%

20 0.29% 98.85% 0.20% 99.31% 0.46%

 

sorry if that isn't too easy to read

 

the point is, beyond the first tick, the acceleration (the difference between the two proc chances, shrinks). So it isn't actually a 10% better chance of anything happening, it is a bit smaller.

 

I am merely giving you the math and my preference, what you want to do is purely your own preference. But you were asking for opinions and I gave mine

 

EDIT: I just added in that distribution curve using the percent crit to calculate the proc chance - thanks for this discussion since it made me think of doing that The result was the same, regarding spec and crit.

Edited April 11, 2013 by Nibbon

[Larry_Dallas]

It won't compound ... you will still basically average 3+ procs a minute - this will give you a 20% proc chance instead of 22% - obviously that is 10% better of a chance (per tick). You'd have to do a distribution curve to see the actual effect, but if you do, and you average it, then you will get this:

the difference in a chance of proc (so basically a WM crit) on the first tick is: 20% at 20% and 22% at 22%

by the second tick: 36% and 39.6%

 

it ultimately looks like this

tick crit on cumulative crit on cumulative difference

1 20.00% 20.00% 22.00% 22.00% 2.00%

2 16.00% 36.00% 17.16% 39.16% 3.16%

3 12.80% 48.80% 13.38% 52.54% 3.74%

4 10.24% 59.04% 10.44% 62.98% 3.94%

5 8.19% 67.23% 8.14% 71.13% 3.90%

6 6.55% 73.79% 6.35% 77.48% 3.69%

7 5.24% 79.03% 4.95% 82.43% 3.41%

8 4.19% 83.22% 3.86% 86.30% 3.08%

9 3.36% 86.58% 3.01% 89.31% 2.73%

10 2.68% 89.26% 2.35% 91.66% 2.40%

11 2.15% 91.41% 1.83% 93.50% 2.09%

12 1.72% 93.13% 1.43% 94.93% 1.80%

13 1.37% 94.50% 1.12% 96.04% 1.54%

14 1.10% 95.60% 0.87% 96.91% 1.31%

15 0.88% 96.48% 0.68% 97.59% 1.11%

16 0.70% 97.19% 0.53% 98.12% 0.94%

17 0.56% 97.75% 0.41% 98.54% 0.79%

18 0.45% 98.20% 0.32% 98.86% 0.66%

19 0.36% 98.56% 0.25% 99.11% 0.55%

20 0.29% 98.85% 0.20% 99.31% 0.46%

 

sorry if that isn't too easy to read

 

the point is, beyond the first tick, the acceleration (the difference between the two proc chances, shrinks). So it isn't actually a 10% better chance of anything happening, it is a bit smaller.

 

I am merely giving you the math and my preference, what you want to do is purely your own preference. But you were asking for opinions and I gave mine

 

EDIT: I just added in that distribution curve using the percent crit to calculate the proc chance - thanks for this discussion since it made me think of doing that The result was the same, regarding spec and crit

.

 

Don't apologize at all. This is the most thorough answer I could possibly have hoped for and answers my question as well as I possibly could have expected.

 

Off to the respec guy.

[Nibbon]

Don't apologize at all. This is the most thorough answer I could possibly have hoped for and answers my question as well as I possibly could have expected.

 

Off to the respec guy.

 

Cool

 

And thanks again, I like when people challenge my thinking and end up improving my system! So, really, I appreciate you asking the question in the first place

[paowee]

I'm curious to know what rotation/priority list was used to get the ~2600 DPS Lightning parse. Was Project/Shock used on cooldown or used at all or should this ability be taken off the skill bar? Apologize if this has been mentioned before but just making a quick peek of this thread at work ^_^ Edited April 11, 2013 by paowee

[Nibbon]

I'm curious to know what rotation/priority list was used to get the ~2600 DPS Lightning parse. Was Project/Shock used on cooldown or used at all or should this ability be taken off the skill bar? Apologize if this has been mentioned before but just making a quick peek of this thread at work ^_^

 

I wouldn't take it off your skill bar since it is still useful in fights - but when parsing against a dummy where you don't have to move, then it does not need to be used (you would be casting a disturbance in its place).

 

Here is the 2600+ parse (it was not mine)

http://www.torparse.com/a/167334/3/0/Overview

[paowee]

I wouldn't take it off your skill bar since it is still useful in fights - but when parsing against a dummy where you don't have to move, then it does not need to be used (you would be casting a disturbance in its place).

 

Here is the 2600+ parse (it was not mine)

http://www.torparse.com/a/167334/3/0/Overview

 

Thank you. Time to check out # of hits for each ability!

[bryceman]

Crit is not on the same line as alacrity and surge (and accuracy)

 

so it is power > crit

and accuracy > surge > alacrity

 

TK has some auto crit, and you'll find your overall crit percentage is close to 30% with the right spec. Surge is still one of the best curves in the game in terms of diminishing returns and I already explained my thoughts on alacrity in my previous post. Accuracy, there really is no question, you need 5 mods at minimum against boss mobs (where you have a 10% miss chance - 4% will come from your spec and companion affection) each mod is about 1% - so the optimal amount is between 99%-100% hit/miss. That leaves room for only 4 more enhancements, and as I've mentioned, I think 4 surge is probably the best - leaving 0 alacrity.

 

I'll reiterate again here, I think the optimal gearing situation is:

-6 accuracy, 4 surge, 0 alacrity --- all power (no crit) -- all willpower augments

-I believe you could trade up to 3 surge for 3 alacrity without losing out on too much DPS and I believe you should do so based on personal preference

-I don't use TK, I use balance and everything here is based off a fairly static spreadsheet - albeit one I spent a lot of time on.

 

Don't know if this has been asked yet but should we pick up the earpieces and/or enhancements that have acc. on them?

[Nibbon]

Don't know if this has been asked yet but should we pick up the earpieces and/or enhancements that have acc. on them?

 

accuracy enhancements - as a sage - the only earpieces and implants you can really get are the power surge ones

[bryceman]

accuracy enhancements - as a sage - the only earpieces and implants you can really get are the power surge ones

 

Sorry meant to say acc. earpieces and IMPLANTS. Hope I am not bugging you but I have one more question; should we be getting the more mainstat heavy mods or the ones that have a little less mainstat but more secondary stat (in our case power). I ask because I know that we receive a little bit of crit from our mainstat but I am under the impression that more damage is derived from the power stat rather than the mainstat.

Edited April 12, 2013 by bryceman

[Nibbon]

Sorry meant to say acc. earpieces and IMPLANTS. Hope I am not bugging you but I have one more question; should we be getting the more mainstat heavy mods or the ones that have a little less mainstat but more secondary stat (in our case power).

 

I'm not sure there are good accuracy earpices and implants for sages - so again, I'd get the power surge earpiece and implants.

 

It isn't necessarily a question of main stat vs secondary stat - it is usually a question of endurance or dps stat - and the answer is DPS stat (so anything with higher endurance is bad). In any case you are probably asking about "A" lettered mods vs. unlettered - the answer is unlettered is better.

[KTap]

I'm not sure there are good accuracy earpices and implants for sages - so again, I'd get the power surge earpiece and implants.

 

It isn't necessarily a question of main stat vs secondary stat - it is usually a question of endurance or dps stat - and the answer is DPS stat (so anything with higher endurance is bad). In any case you are probably asking about "A" lettered mods vs. unlettered - the answer is unlettered is better.

 

There's a good accuracy earpiece (Arkanian level though, not ultimate)

 

159 Endurance

159 willpower

72 accuracy

77 power

 

Don't think you can buy it though, I got it from a boss. (Black Market Force-Lord's MK-2 Relay)

 

 

btw thank you for the data, even though I don't really understand the spreadsheet lol.

 

What would you say the dps difference is in using 300 crit (about 5% chance) vs 300 power?

 

Also, have you done any testing of relics? currently using power ones but I'm curious how the new proc ones fare against them. I just switched to dps a few days before 2.0 and didn't even have the sorcerer made when the pts was available so I'm not ideally geared, relic wise at least.

 

Just noticed this thread is about balance, I'm Lightning/Telekinetics if that makes any difference for gearing.

Edited April 12, 2013 by KTap

[Nibbon]

There's a good accuracy earpiece (Arkanian level though, not ultimate)

 

159 Endurance

159 willpower

72 accuracy

77 power

 

Don't think you can buy it though, I got it from a boss. (Black Market Force-Lord's MK-2 Relay)

That is good, certainly an upgrade from black hole, but not BiS. Arkanian Force-Mystic's Device (ear) has 98 power, 72 surge and 143 willpower. So on yours you are trading 21 power for 16 willpower, which is not a good trade - I'm talking 1.5 DPS or so here, but still not BiS.

btw thank you for the data, even though I don't really understand the spreadsheet lol.

Your welcome. There's a few tabs and it can be a bit of a web, so I see how it can get confusing The main tab you want to focus on for stats is the "stat" tab. The values highlighted in turquoise are the ones you can play with to see how they effect DPS (value yellow). "Damage and buffs" tab is the spec and the damage values (of the spells) which you don't need to look at, but you can play around with to see how the different specs effect dps. The other tabs are just feeding those two tabs I just mentioned.

What would you say the dps difference is in using 300 crit (about 5% chance) vs 300 power?

At Arkanian, it is about 30 DPS lower to sub in 300 crit for power.

Also, have you done any testing of relics? currently using power ones but I'm curious how the new proc ones fare against them. I just switched to dps a few days before 2.0 and didn't even have the sorcerer made when the pts was available so I'm not ideally geared, relic wise at least.

No, I didn't and still don't have access to relics

 

I can guess that you will want the power click relic and the damage relic (energy uses force crit). The relic on the spreadsheet is the old DG one (which is better than the new current DG ones that have no power and a lower proc damage). It is really easy to see the effect of the relics on DPS, though.

 

Here's some math for you:

Arkanian relic of boundless ages (power click): 29 permanent power and 395 power for 30 seconds (usable every 2 minutes means you divide the 395 power by 4). So the DPS increase is similar to (this isn't exact since you'd pop the relic as the same time as other cooldowns, so it is actually higher) an increase of 128 power - translates to an increase of 50 dps (From nothing).

 

Arkanian relic of elemental transcendence (dmg proc relic) this one is harder to calculate, but I have it in the spreadsheet so, plugging in the numbers, you get an increase of 41 dps from proc plus the 29 power which also gives 11 dps for a total of 52 dps.

 

Both are about equally good - but consider you can time your power click relic to match up with mental alacrity, force potency, maybe a sentinel's inspiration, and an adrenal - then it is actually a lot more than just 50 added dps (since the damage is getting multiplied) - you might be looking at something closer to 70-80 (just a guess).

Just noticed this thread is about balance, I'm Lightning/Telekinetics if that makes any difference for gearing.

It does make a difference - I have separate spreadsheets for each skill tree. My TK one is actually better (maybe more accurate, but not necessarily) as I did it second and learned from the first one.

[Wichahpi]

No problem, I wound up going with this:

http://pts.swtor-spy.com/skill-tree-calculator/jedi-sage/224/?build=030000000000000000000000000000000023020000000000000000000000000003220322013100210122032002010100&ver=20

 

Is this still true after it went live? Or have you changed it a little?And is this build for PVE end game?

Edited April 12, 2013 by Wichahpi

[Nibbon]

Is this still true after it went live? Or have you changed it a little?And is this build for PVE end game?

 

Close, but not true, actually.

 

I ended up putting the 2 points from clamoring force into force gift. Rest is the same.

 

http://pts.swtor-spy.com/skill-tree-calculator/jedi-sage/224/?build=230000000000000000000000000000000023000000000000000000000000000003220322013100210122032002010100&ver=20

[Nibbon]

I'm looking into the relics a bit more:

 

The question is if the internal/elemental are better than the kinetic/energy for raiding. Internal is better than kinetic on the dummy, where you have no armor debuff - but when you have a 20% armor reduction on the boss - I believe kinetic is actually slightly better.

 

Math here is real simple

 

241 elemental at 0% DR

 

322 energy at 15% DR (this is the 35% normally found on a boss with 20% from sunder strike) = 322 * .85 = ~274 ... so in a raid situation this is hitting harder.