3.0 Mercenary/DPS guide by Fascinate & Marisi

[cs_zoltan]

With 10 Power Shots, you also get 5 Supercharge Burn ticks for a total of 6094 damage per Supercharge Gas Use.

 

10 Fusion Missiles: 36,660

10 Power Shots and 1 Supercharge Burn: 35,544

It's close which makes the usage a gamble of personal choice.

 

Don't forget to also include the 10% DoT damage boost to the SCG and the 10 vented heat.

[Kinslayer]

I can see that as well, but for someone learning off of Dulfy''s site, if they try the rotation, it won't work. The author can make a simple adjustment to fix that.

 

Essentially the rotation can be outlined as:

 

Opener

Heat Ramping

Cycle through the General rotation until TSO is off CD at which point it moves back into the Heat Ramping variation.

 

Um.

[MiaowZedong]

Here are numbers to show how Fusion Missile compares to Power Shot.

Sample parse here:

http://imgur.com/28KwshU

This was done with the Armor Module debuff, no relics, old 2 piece set with +15% crit on PS, no health debuff so no advantage below 30% applied.

 

Power Shot does 253,302 damage with 86 uses: 2945 damage per use

Fusion Missile does (26,724 + 46,596) damage with 20 uses: 3666 damage per use

 

With 10 Power Shots, you also get 5 Supercharge Burn ticks for a total of 6094 damage per Supercharge Gas Use.

 

10 Fusion Missiles: 36,660

10 Power Shots and 1 Supercharge Burn: 35,544

It's close which makes the usage a gamble of personal choice.

 

You make several mistakes in analysing your parse

 

—You are applying a debuff that boosts FM damage (from Incendiary Missile) but not the corresponding debuff that boosts Power Shot (from Serrated Shot).

—You have different crit rates for Fusion Missile (45% initial, 31.7% DoT) and Power Shot (37.8%). This is greater than the effect of the relevant passives, it's just RNG noise.

—Pursuant to the above: while the crit rates may seem to actually benefit PS, looking at the difference between average critical hit and average non critical hit, it seems the crit rate fell disproportionately on the offhand hits (you can tell this because if it was perfectly proportional, the effective surge of PS would be higher by 30 percent-points than FM and the same as Incendiary Missile, but in your parse it is much lower than this). Again, RNG noise distorting your results.

 

Sorry to be a spoil-sport

 

This is also a good example of why it's usually simpler to calculate expected damage than it is to analyse a parse. As you can see, you parsed for an actually fairly long time and still had significant RNG noise. If you want to use parses for theorycraft, it's best to use scripts (if that's even allowed by the ToS, if not just don't bother) because, well, you will need to parse for a very long time without ever allowing debuffs to drop off and that's just brutal for a human doing it.

Edited December 24, 2014 by MiaowZedong

[MahBoyDray]

For all those questioning Fascinate & Marisi's guide, I wouldn't be so quick to judge and throw shots. Fasc & Marisi have been the 2 highest psrsing Mercs in the game for quite a long period of time.

Try it out for yourself, play it differently if you want, but their rotations are solid.

 

Fascinate also has the highest existing 3.0 PTS parse in game, for any class, so that's something to consider as well.

[cs_zoltan]

For all those questioning Fascinate & Marisi's guide, I wouldn't be so quick to judge and throw shots. Fasc & Marisi have been the 2 highest psrsing Mercs in the game for quite a long period of time.

Try it out for yourself, play it differently if you want, but their rotations are solid.

 

Fascinate also has the highest existing 3.0 PTS parse in game, for any class, so that's something to consider as well.

 

That doesn't make them unerring, everyone makes mistakes. Blind idolization doesn't help anyone, questioning each other can only improve us all.

I brought up valid points, the ball is on their court. If they can counter them that means their rotation is the right one, so good for us. If they can't that means we should use something better then, still good for us though.

It's not personal, I'm only questioning their rotation not attacking them.

Edited December 24, 2014 by cs_zoltan

[BreakingNews]

So I can't really wrap my head around this rotation you guys use. For future reference I type my and your general rotation down:

 

Yours:

 

UL->Filler1->PS(StB use)->MS->IM->SS->PS->Filler2->MS(StB proc)

 

Filler1: EN>TD>MB>RS

Filler2: PS>RS

 

 

Mine:

 

IM->Filler1->PS(StB use)->MS->TD->Filler2->SS->UL->MS(StB proc)

 

Filler1: EN>FM (sub30% only)>PS>RS

Filler2: EN>MB>RS

 

 

 

Now these are my problems with it:

 

1. It's less mobile. That's obvious, not a big deal, moving on...

 

2. In your rotation TD is only a filler and it's place is taken by a second mandatory PS. TD is so much stronger that I just can't understand why would you do this? Even with the SCG stack that PS builds it still doesn't compete with TD.

 

 

I did some math on the subject, but in absence of the coefficents I had to base it on tooltip damage relative to my gear :/

 

TD's damage after armor and all the debuffs with avaraged crit: 5123,475

PS's damage after armor and all the debuffs with avaraged crit and off-hand hit: 3364

 

Damage gained from SCG: 9600,5

 

10 TD: 51234,75

10 PS + SCG: (43240,5)

 

EDIT: Forgot to account for the 10 vented heat in case of PS. So new value : 46604,5

 

 

 

3. The rotation is too strict with heat and GCDs.

 

-First example, AoE:

 

If you'd want to use FM as a filler for adds, you'd have to drop TD for it because you either don't have the GCD for it or the heat or both (depending where you use FM).

In my rotation I have 2 place where I can use FM for adds and all I lose for it is a single PS which, based on my second point, is less of a dps loss than TD.

 

 

-Second example, Execute phase:

 

In your rotation you either replace TD with MB (which is a dps loss) or you use both in which case all your GCDs are tied up and that's heavily heat negative to the point where it's unsustainable without heat management cooldowns. Also you can no way in hell squeez in a FM, which is stonger in execute phase than PS.

 

EDIT: Forgot to account for the 10 vented heat in case of PS, so FM is only better than PS if you can't get 10 stack of SCG before the end of the fight

 

In contrast to that, with my rotation you can use both TD and MB and even sustain it for a longer period (not indefinitely though) and even have a leftover GCD to squeez in FM when you have cooldowns up.

 

So I wonder what your reasons are?

 

 

 

(PS: I used "my rotation" a lot, but in fact it was based on Gyro's PTS rotation, so most credit goes to him )

 

Have you actually watched the rotation video? If you did, you would see that td is used off cd whenever vent heat is up, or if its heat ramping. There is only one place for a PS filler, as the 2 other ones are used to proc IPA, and the filler PS is only used when its either heat ramping, or if we have room to spare to fit that ps and a td into the rotation, otherwise we have forego the 3rd ps, replace it with a rapid shot, and fit in td. Also, this entire spec is heat restrictive with whatever rotation you try to use, so I don't see that as a valid point of argument. In regards to the execute phase, if you actually read the guide or watched the video, you would see that mb and td are being fit in wherever possible. Additionally, doing so will not allow the usage of FM, either you would have to delay IPA by one gcd doing so, or replace mb or td to fit it in.

[Ryuku-sama]

Have you actually watched the rotation video? If you did, you would see that td is used off cd whenever vent heat is up, or if its heat ramping. There is only one place for a PS filler, as the 2 other ones are used to proc IPA, and the filler PS is only used when its either heat ramping, or if we have room to spare to fit that ps and a td into the rotation, otherwise we have forego the 3rd ps, replace it with a rapid shot, and fit in td. Also, this entire spec is heat restrictive with whatever rotation you try to use, so I don't see that as a valid point of argument. In regards to the execute phase, if you actually read the guide or watched the video, you would see that mb and td are being fit in wherever possible. Additionally, doing so will not allow the usage of FM, either you would have to delay IPA by one gcd doing so, or replace mb or td to fit it in.

 

I'll say it again. Why don't you use Unload to proc IPA?? It would give you two fillers and a given place to put TD without breaking your heat at all. YOUR rotation is heat restrictive.

[cs_zoltan]

Have you actually watched the rotation video?

Yes I've read it, more carefuly than you read my post it seems. No I didn't watch the video.

 

If you did, you would see that td is used off cd whenever vent heat is up, or if its heat ramping. There is only one place for a PS filler, as the 2 other ones are used to proc IPA, and the filler PS is only used when its either heat ramping, or if we have room to spare to fit that ps and a td into the rotation, otherwise we have forego the 3rd ps, replace it with a rapid shot, and fit in td.

So you just confirmed for me that you don't use TD on cd every time.

Also the PS I was talking about is one of the IPA proccer, since you use PS for both IPA instead of 1 PS and 1 UL, so you tie down and extra 1 GCD of the 10 GCD rotation for PS which wouldn't be necessary.

Also, this entire spec is heat restrictive with whatever rotation you try to use, so I don't see that as a valid point of argument.

If you want to use both DoTs, UL, TD and proc IPA on cd your rotation is unsustainable, Gyro's isn't. And the only thing you gain is 1-3 SCG stack/minute, which I doubt is worth it. (10 TD > 10 PS + SCG - 10 heat)

In regards to the execute phase, if you actually read the guide or watched the video, you would see that mb and td are being fit in wherever possible. Additionally, doing so will not allow the usage of FM, either you would have to delay IPA by one gcd doing so, or replace mb or td to fit it in.

See that is a perfect example what my problem is with your rotation. It has a lot of ifs and whens.

 

And my point was exactly that you can't fit in TD, MB every time and an occasional FM with YOUR rotation but you COULD with GYRO'S.

[MahBoyDray]

That doesn't make them unerring, everyone makes mistakes. Blind idolization doesn't help anyone, questioning each other can only improve us all.

I brought up valid points, the ball is on their court. If they can counter them that means their rotation is the right one, so good for us. If they can't that means we should use something better then, still good for us though.

It's not personal, I'm only questioning their rotation not attacking them.

 

Yea that's understandable. I may have worded my original comment wrong and made it seem like blind idolization. I too was skeptical of a few things at first so I had a chat to Fasc, mainly about IO and and frrom using their rotation I've already hit over 5k.

Questions are always good to help players understand their class, especislly with the changes that were introduced in 3.0, so apologies if I seemed like I was just saying 'Sorry, you're trash'.

[BreakingNews]

I'll say it again. Why don't you use Unload to proc IPA?? It would give you two fillers and a given place to put TD without breaking your heat at all. YOUR rotation is heat restrictive.

 

Because using unload to proc ipa will make stb alternate between usage for ss and ps, the rotation in the guide makes it so that the usage of stb remains consistent, and also, a rotation that revolves around pushing the max dps WILL be resource restrictive, if it wasn't i'd be pulling less dps

[BreakingNews]

and to zoltan, the rotation puts more emphasis on having both dots up at the same time, which we feel puts priority over td usage. And if you want me to be as specific as I can with the usage of td and mb, during regular and execute phase, watch the video. The usage of td and mb is fit into fillers where it would not push us over 40 heat, so td would only be used if we had 15 or less heat and mb if we had 20 or less heat. Finally, if your pushing for your rotation to be valid, please post a parse to validate your claim Edited December 24, 2014 by BreakingNews

[Ryuku-sama]

Because using unload to proc ipa will make stb alternate between usage for ss and ps, the rotation in the guide makes it so that the usage of stb remains consistent, and also, a rotation that revolves around pushing the max dps WILL be resource restrictive, if it wasn't i'd be pulling less dps

 

What the **** are pulling out of your hat??? First Mag in your rotation will proc STB.. follow up with a instant PS to proc IPA and you're done.. the next STB will proc in 15 sec.. by that time you will have use SS already and will only need to reapply IM and TD...

 

Opener : SB > Mag > insta-PS > IM > TD > Mag > Filler

Rotation : Un > Filler > SB > Mag > insta-PS > IM > TD > Mag > Filler

 

Exactly 7.5s between every IPA.

TD on CD.

STB on the PS proccing IPA and procced every 15s just before PS.

[DieGhostDie]

What the **** are pulling out of your hat??? First Mag in your rotation will proc STB.. follow up with a instant PS to proc IPA and you're done.. the next STB will proc in 15 sec.. by that time you will have use SS already and will only need to reapply IM and TD...

 

Opener : SB > Mag > insta-PS > IM > TD > Mag > Filler

Rotation : Un > Filler > SB > Mag > insta-PS > IM > TD > Mag > Filler

 

Exactly 7.5s between every IPA.

TD on CD.

STB on the PS proccing IPA and procced every 15s just before PS.

 

If I used your opener, I will be doing less DPS than what Fascinate posted. Thank you.

[Ryuku-sama]

If I used your opener, I will be doing less DPS than what Fascinate posted. Thank you.

 

Eh? Basicly I delay IM by 1 tick. 1 tick of IM is 863 damage... On a 3 min parse?? It's 863/180 = 5 DPS.

 

On the other hand.. delaying TD.. Which does 6295 is a lot more DPS lost.

 

And you can move the opener around to have : SS > IM > Mag > PS > TD > Filler > Filler

 

And the rotation would become : Unl > SS > IM > Mag > PS > TD > FIller > Filler

 

I just don't like having both filler back to back.. Having them around Unlod allow to offset the cost, play around when TSO is up and control your heat better.

Edited December 24, 2014 by Ryuku-sama

[BreakingNews]

What the **** are pulling out of your hat??? First Mag in your rotation will proc STB.. follow up with a instant PS to proc IPA and you're done.. the next STB will proc in 15 sec.. by that time you will have use SS already and will only need to reapply IM and TD...

 

Opener : SB > Mag > insta-PS > IM > TD > Mag > Filler

Rotation : Un > Filler > SB > Mag > insta-PS > IM > TD > Mag > Filler

 

Exactly 7.5s between every IPA.

TD on CD.

STB on the PS proccing IPA and procced every 15s just before PS.

 

With that opener, yes that rotation would work, with my opener no, that wouldnt work tho. So sorry for any confusion or misunderstanding, thought you were referring to my opener. And I've known about this rotation, but we felt that putting more emphasis on having both dots up at the same time is much more beneficial. Also, I'll say the same to you as I said to zoltan, post a parse.

[Projawa]

Interesting suggestions and constructive criticisms in this thread. The posters who feel strongly one way or another about what is better or not better should post parses to prove their assertions, just as the guide authors did to prove theirs, so that any improvements can be included to help the community. Edited December 25, 2014 by Projawa

[RookB]

You make several mistakes in analysing your parse

 

—You are applying a debuff that boosts FM damage (from Incendiary Missile) but not the corresponding debuff that boosts Power Shot (from Serrated Shot).

—You have different crit rates for Fusion Missile (45% initial, 31.7% DoT) and Power Shot (37.8%). This is greater than the effect of the relevant passives, it's just RNG noise.

—Pursuant to the above: while the crit rates may seem to actually benefit PS, looking at the difference between average critical hit and average non critical hit, it seems the crit rate fell disproportionately on the offhand hits (you can tell this because if it was perfectly proportional, the effective surge of PS would be higher by 30 percent-points than FM and the same as Incendiary Missile, but in your parse it is much lower than this). Again, RNG noise distorting your results.

 

Sorry to be a spoil-sport

 

This is also a good example of why it's usually simpler to calculate expected damage than it is to analyse a parse. As you can see, you parsed for an actually fairly long time and still had significant RNG noise. If you want to use parses for theorycraft, it's best to use scripts (if that's even allowed by the ToS, if not just don't bother) because, well, you will need to parse for a very long time without ever allowing debuffs to drop off and that's just brutal for a human doing it.

 

The armor debuff module applies the same effect IM and SS would apply automatically,

This was just one quick parse trying to show a simple point. The crits may be high, but try it out yourself. I've done this several times in game and on the simulator with the same results. The simulator will even do it thousands of times to rule out the RNG.

I'm not advocating FM as regular use filler. If you end a dummy parse with 9 stacks of Supercharge, you could have used FM a few times for a little more damage. This would be hard to predict live though.

Personally, I would use it once during the initial burn while the adrenal is up, then once when you're about 10 seconds to kill if your Supercharge stacks are low. But, to each their own.

Edited December 25, 2014 by RookB
Clarity

[cs_zoltan]

and to zoltan, the rotation puts more emphasis on having both dots up at the same time, which we feel puts priority over td usage.

Or you could simply have both...

 

And if you want me to be as specific as I can with the usage of td and mb, during regular and execute phase, watch the video. The usage of td and mb is fit into fillers where it would not push us over 40 heat, so td would only be used if we had 15 or less heat and mb if we had 20 or less heat.

Or you could use them both ON cd exactly WITHOUT ifs and whens.

 

Finally, if your pushing for your rotation to be valid, please post a parse to validate your claim

Sorry that I try to argue with reason instead of epeen. Give my your gear and then I'll parse

 

Let me spell it out then because it really goes over your head I see:

(for simplicity's sake I avoid execute phase now and EN as filler)

In your rotation you ALWAYS use:

1 SS

1 IM

2 MS

2 PS

1 UL

 

2 Filler

 

1 of the filler is always RS, or PS when it's heat ramping phase.

The other filler is either TD or RS DEPENDING ON YOUR HEAT

 

I always use:

1 SS

1 IM

2 MS

1 PS

1 UL

1 TD

 

2 Filler

 

1 is always RS or FM when VH is up.

The other filler is PS or RS DEPENDING ON MY HEAT

 

Now the Execute phase

 

Using both TD and MB on cd:

Your rotation: Heat negative by 24 heat, has no spare GCD

Gyro's rotation: Heat negative by 9 heat, has 1 spare GCD

 

EN usage:

You skip TD for it (either directly by using it's GCD or indirectly because of heat).

We skip PS for it.

 

 

Can you see the difference now?

[Ryuku-sama]

Or you could simply have both...

 

 

Or you could use them both ON cd exactly WITHOUT ifs and whens.

 

 

Sorry that I try to argue with reason instead of epeen. Give my your gear and then I'll parse

 

Let me spell it out then because it really goes over your head I see:

(for simplicity's sake I avoid execute phase now and EN as filler)

In your rotation you ALWAYS use:

1 SS

1 IM

2 MS

2 PS

1 UL

 

2 Filler

 

1 of the filler is always RS, or PS when it's heat ramping phase.

The other filler is either TD or RS DEPENDING ON YOUR HEAT

 

I always use:

1 SS

1 IM

2 MS

1 PS

1 UL

1 TD

 

2 Filler

 

1 is always RS or FM or PS when VH is up.

The other filler is PS or RS DEPENDING ON MY HEAT

 

Now the Execute phase

 

Using both TD and MB on cd:

Your rotation: Heat negative by 24 heat, has no spare GCD

Gyro's rotation: Heat negative by 9 heat, has 1 spare GCD

 

EN usage:

You skip TD for it (either directly by using it's GCD or indirectly because of heat).

We skip PS for it.

 

 

Can you see the difference now?

 

Fusion Missile may have great damage, but no need to start an argument about Fusion Missile vs Power Shot when there are much more important things to start arguments about.. Such as THermal Detonator uses, Electro-Net uses, how to do an execute rotation without screwing your heat too much....

[Kinslayer]

Sorry that I try to argue with reason instead of epeen. Give my your gear and then I'll parse

 

Can you do one anyway? I really don't care about the DPS or what gear you're in, but I am interested in your APM and your ability distribution.

[cs_zoltan]

I posted loads on the PTS forum, but sure when I get back to my gaming PC.

[TACeMossie]

Oh and torparse is back, so use that

[BreakingNews]

I've already stated I knew about that rotation, it pulled less dps then what I'm currently using right now, here and on pts. And if you want to bring pts into play, I didn't say anything about it because of NDA, but me and mari were pulling about 300 more dps on average with 3 more apm, and all of us had the same gear. Edited December 26, 2014 by BreakingNews

[cs_zoltan]

Can you do one anyway? I really don't care about the DPS or what gear you're in, but I am interested in your APM and your ability distribution.

Well I'm not on my gaming PC, but w/e, good enough for ability breakdown: http://puu.sh/dJTEZ/73fb67ac83.png

Oh and torparse is back, so use that

Here you go Tac, do with it what you will http://puu.sh/dJTJj/8db324239d.png

[TACeMossie]

Well I'm not on my gaming PC, but w/e, good enough for ability breakdown: http://puu.sh/dJTEZ/73fb67ac83.png

 

Here you go Tac, do with it what you will http://puu.sh/dJTJj/8db324239d.png

 

/flips table