Power vs Critical Rating for Sawbones

[Iheamylap]

I was wondering what some of y'alls input would be for whether it is more beneficial for a Sawbones smuggler to focus on Power as a secondary stat or Critical Rating.

 

I've read some where getting critical heals is a must. However, it seems Power gives an over all constant and dependable boost (that stacks with other heal boosts provided by Cunning, etc).

 

Currently, as a lvl 24 Sawbones, I have been stacking Power and liked ensuring my heals are decently high, and I still get a fair amount of criticals....but I haven't tried focusing on critical.

 

What are y'alls thoughts and experiences?

[Larce_Apollo]

I went all out critical, at 39 it's freaking amazing.

[bshenkd]

I too am focusing most of my secondary stats on crit/surge. The combination seems amazing. I was hitting over 3k crit heals as a level 39 in flashpoints.

[Azaranth]

I understand the draw of power, for reliable output, but keep in mind that Diagnostic Scan returns energy when you crit. It's not hard to get a 2/3rds crit rate on DS, which means 4 free energy every time you cast it. That's not shabby.

 

FWIW, the devs seem to see crit as our secondary stat. Most of Sawbones gear I've seen itemizes stats in the following priority:

 

1. Cunning

2. Endurance

3. Crit

4. Power

5. Everything else. (Surge, Alacrity, etc)

[Iheamylap]

I understand the draw of power, for reliable output, but keep in mind that Diagnostic Scan returns energy when you crit. It's not hard to get a 2/3rds crit rate on DS, which means 4 free energy every time you cast it. That's not shabby.

 

FWIW, the devs seem to see crit as our secondary stat. Most of Sawbones gear I've seen itemizes stats in the following priority:

 

1. Cunning

2. Endurance

3. Crit

4. Power

5. Everything else. (Surge, Alacrity, etc)

 

Ah ya know, I didn't think about Critical with Diagnostic Scan. I don't use it much right now, because I haven't gotten around to beefing it up in the Skill tree's yet.

 

Doing a bit more reading, I think I will slowly start converting over Power to Crit as I continue leveling and replacing Mods. Power is tempting, but looking more at DS and thinking about getting crits on the more energy efficient Slow Release Medpac, I'm wanting to agree on Crit being more important now. =]

 

Thanks for the feedback!

[Mekrath]

Anyone else with an opinion on this? I went pretty much all out power as I assumed consistently higher healing was better than relying on a lucky crit, and at level 50 I seem to be doing pretty well as a healer.

[Iheamylap]

Anyone else with an opinion on this? I went pretty much all out power as I assumed consistently higher healing was better than relying on a lucky crit, and at level 50 I seem to be doing pretty well as a healer.

 

What is your over all power stacked at? Do you mind looking in your character sheet and telling us what bonus you get for healing? You'll get that by overing over your Healing stat in the Tech (or another) window and it will show Power's modifier and how much it gives. My power is 53, but I can't remember how much + it gives (at work while posting this).

[sentawan]

With the crit bonus buff and DS crit extras, I went crit. I like that I have (lvl 30) a native 25% crit chance and in DS around 50%. Power's bonus to healing and damage wasn't high enough compared to the crit chance's 50% native bonus to healing and damage when you are critting 25-50% of the time. Edited December 30, 2011 by sentawan

[Mekrath]

What is your over all power stacked at? Do you mind looking in your character sheet and telling us what bonus you get for healing? You'll get that by overing over your Healing stat in the Tech (or another) window and it will show Power's modifier and how much it gives. My power is 53, but I can't remember how much + it gives (at work while posting this).

 

Ok - Power is 418 for +71.1 Bonus healing. Crit is 134 for +5.48% crit chance. What I am not sure of is what percentage over my base healing that 71.1 represents, so it's hard to compare. Add to that surge which seems to appear more on crit gear and the fact that losing power on gear would also take away from my alacrity rating as I have that on a lot of power gear, and my head starts to spin

[Porall]

Interesting that alacrity is paired up with power. Sawbones has almost all instant casts, so don't see the need for alacrity. I too am heavily in +crit and healing well. Edited December 31, 2011 by Porall

[Iheamylap]

Ok - Power is 418 for +71.1 Bonus healing. Crit is 134 for +5.48% crit chance. What I am not sure of is what percentage over my base healing that 71.1 represents, so it's hard to compare. Add to that surge which seems to appear more on crit gear and the fact that losing power on gear would also take away from my alacrity rating as I have that on a lot of power gear, and my head starts to spin

 

Thank you for the numbers!

 

Yeah, my head starts to spin when I really think about the stuff too lol

 

I wish Power would give more of a bonus. 418 power yielding only a _71.1 bonus seems kinda weak. But, at least it stacks with other bonuses and is constant.

 

I suppose you could unequip all the gear with +Power, fire a number of heals, and then re-equip and check the difference. If I remember, I'll do something similar tonight.

[StarCadence]

Sorry to crash the party smugglers, but saw the thread and thought I'd add something to thing about ...

 

I'm a combat medic, and have stacked crit/surge and while the heals are awesome ... my crits do pull aggro off the level 42 tank I run with on a frequent basis (I am only lvl 38 thus far). For me, the heavy armor helps deal with it until their attention is retaken ... and I know you guys have more stuns and such, just thought I should throw that out there though as something to consider.

[Maxvla]

With how stats work in this game you never want to tunnel vision stack a single stat. Stats all have diminishing returns meaning the more you stack the less of a boost you get from it.

 

To this end you want to identify all stats that are useful and get as even a mix of them as possible to limit your loss in item budget to diminished returns. If a class had extraordinary benefit from a certain stat you can stack into diminish further because the stat is more important to start with.

 

For sawbones power, tech power, crit, surge, cunning, and possibly aim (not sure if that is damage only) are the stats to stack. Cunning diminishes far slower than secondary stats so feel free to stack it to your hearts content, but the rest you should keep even. Our class/spec does not gain more from one secondary stat than another (except alacrity, which is situationally good, but in general is not something you want to have) so there is no reason to stack crit more since we have no talents that make critting more a significant advantage like other classes who rely on crits to keep proc buffs up. The bonus to crit on a couple heals on the next to top of our tree is good, but not good enough to alter our even distribution.

[Porall]

To this end you want to identify all stats that are useful and get as even a mix of them as possible to limit your loss in item budget to diminished returns. If a class had extraordinary benefit from a certain stat you can stack into diminish further because the stat is more important to start with.

 

Good point. Currently at lvl 35 I have about 20.1% crit chance. It'll be interesting to hear what the soft and hard caps are for the stats. For now I might limit it to 20% and get more power.

[Azaranth]

I'm currently at ~600 cunning, and have yet to see any diminishing returns on the value it contributes to Bonus Healing. It's stayed linear at 0.14 Bonus Healing per point of Cunning. I'll let you know if/when I find a soft cap.

 

For now, my recommendation is not to worry about diminishing returns until you're level 50.

[pomg]

Soft caps might be level dependend, the higher you level the heigher you soft cap.

[Larce_Apollo]

I'm now critting 3k+ heals with underworld medicine and 1.6k+ on shoot first as a 42 as examples, some of the other attacks are 2k+. I've had chain crits on heals where my target is down to 10-20% health and with 2, maybe 3 heals is all the way back up. It takes a bit, as in you need to stack heavy in it, but once you do at get to my level range it's amazing.

 

I'm seeing a consistent amount of crits now too, just not once in awhile, it's really saved my butt in several cases now. I've reversed the outcome of fights by crit healing corso or a team member all the way back to 100% health within seconds.

[Azaranth]

Soft caps might be level dependend, the higher you level the heigher you soft cap.

 

Personally, I suspect that primary stats aren't soft capped, but that the secondary stats (crit, alacrity) might be.

[Maxvla]

They do, but only in so far as their crit addition.

 

Primary stat - CRIT ADDED

 

400 7.13

500 8.63

600 10.03

700 11.34

800 12.56

900 13.70

1000 14.77

1100 15.77

1200 16.70

1300 17.57

1400 18.39

1500 19.15

1600 19.86

1700 20.53

1800 21.15

1900 21.73

2000 22.27

[Azaranth]

They do, but only in so far as their crit addition.

 

Primary stat - CRIT ADDED

 

400 7.13

500 8.63

600 10.03

700 11.34

800 12.56

900 13.70

1000 14.77

1100 15.77

1200 16.70

1300 17.57

1400 18.39

1500 19.15

1600 19.86

1700 20.53

1800 21.15

1900 21.73

2000 22.27

 

Ah, that makes sense. I seriously doubt that core stats will have any sort of diminishing returns on their contribution to damage or healing though.

[Newsinz]

I have been stacking Endurance a bit more for survivability... I may have to switch up Cunning. I just like the survivability lol.

 

However... I have been doing Crit and Alacrity. At level 41 I have seen my crit heals hit 3300 give or take a couple points of healing. And Alacrity does help with GCD. When I was Power like many have said... the heals were frequently better but I did not crit as much.

 

Ill do some testing and see about getting some footage. Just to show the differences between the too healing a friend of mine... Im sure he wont mind being my test subject lol.

 

Ill also see if I can do some timing as well with Alacrity to see if actually helps with HoT tic... seems its 50/50 on if it works that way or not. If not I think it should. Giving someone an extra tic of heal would make it worthwhile for sure.

 

Anyway, to the person 2 posts up thank you for the breakdown on crit and softcap. That really helps!

[Stigas]

Alacrity is an exceptionally underwhelming stat in this game. The classes that could benefit from it can't be excited about it because:

 

 

1. It doesn't increase regeneration
   
2. You're stuck with a set amount of resource
   
3. It doesn't lower the GCD, and even if it did you're back to problem 1.
   

 

 

That being said, I think that Combat Logs will reveal easy-to-reach breakpoints for Crit and Surge, and the tactic for Sawbones will be:

 

 

• Crit to breakpoint
  
• Surge to breakpoint
  
• stack the crap out of Power
  

 

[Centerpin]

To me I feel that Alacrity is extremely helpful ya I wish I would get some energy replenish out of it. When I pop my Alacrity relic with my stack of upper hand and DS my energy to cap in 2 channels (Which is pretty quick) its not bad at all IMO. This is in a pve situation mind you.

 

But having a combat log might change my feelings about it.

Edited January 4, 2012 by Centerpin

[Azaranth]

Alacrity is an exceptionally underwhelming stat in this game. The classes that could benefit from it can't be excited about it because:

 

1. It doesn't increase regeneration
   
2. You're stuck with a set amount of resource
   
3. It doesn't lower the GCD, and even if it did you're back to problem 1.
   

 

... And you'll notice they put Alacrity on all the end game 'medic' gear

 

 

That being said, I think that Combat Logs will reveal easy-to-reach breakpoints for Crit and Surge, and the tactic for Sawbones will be:

 

• Crit to breakpoint
  
• Surge to breakpoint
  
• stack the crap out of Power
  

 

You don't need combat logs to figure those stats out. The character sheet tooltips are pretty explicit, and it doesn't take much math to figure out the breaking points. It's probably not worth the time to figure it out until level 50, as the caps might vary by level. If there's a curious level 50 out there, take off all your gear and just follow this process:

 

1. Mouse over the crit chance section (under the Tech heading) of your character sheet.

2. Record the total value of the cunning stat and it's percentage contribution to your crit chance.

3. Record the total value of +crit stat and it's percentage contribution to your crit chance.

4. Put one piece of gear back on.

5. Repeat this process.

 

Eventually you should have a nice spreadsheet, filled with various data points. Just plot two graphs, one showing the contribution of cunning to crit chance, and one showing the contribution of the +crit stat to crit chance. It should give you a pretty clear picture of where breaking points are at.

 

(You could repeat this process for +surge, but I really doubt anyone has enough surge gear to hit a cap.)

 

This information should become pretty well known as soon as a few more people start farming nightmare mode and end-game ops for better gear.

[Akimbo_Joe]

I dunno, diagnostic scan is a terribly weak heal crit or no crit. I understand the point is to recover energy, but it really seems like a waste of casting. I was wondering whether or not to stack crit or power myself so I googled and found the trooper thread and followed it here, but it seems like the temptation to stack crit is pretty alluring for everyone.

 

As far as alacrity goes, does it reduce the global CD? At lvl 30 I already see alacrity on some of my gear and while I love spamming instant medpack, I could see the usefulness of it for throwing out more HoTs or those quick save heals when you haven't got upper hand ready. The ability to store more than two stacks of upper hand would be nice ( certainly not broken at all... really)!

Edited January 4, 2012 by Akimbo_Joe