Here are the results of a week of spamming Sniper Rifle on the Private Test Server with various superstat setups, and over 50 combinations of Superstat, Form, Passive and Specializations.
The Primary gear I used was Justice Agility with Gambler/Impact, Justice Precision with 2x Gambler and Justice Speed with 2x Impact. Stat Mods and Secondaries are described in the spreadsheet. The objective was to see what could be done with various superstat combinations with Superstat Con and maintaining a base of ~8000HP. Don’t forget to look at the Options tab for tweakable settings and some explanations.
Tested just enough to get what I was looking for, and here they are:
1. Softcapping a non-superstat damage stat could lead to a DPS loss
See the entries for Dex/Int/Con 1 versus Dex/Int/Con 3 under Kinetic Manipulation. Same setup, except one goes with four Intelligence mods, the other goes with three Intelligence and one Ego to take Ego to softcap.
Softcapping Ego resulted in a difference of 1% less damage.
Looks like the loss of superstat bonus, Form bonus and Passive bonus likely resulted in the wash. AoPM and Quarry take Ego to softcap, so those weren’t tested. Looks like Softcapping is only worthwhile for defensive passives.
2. Stacking Ego over Intelligence to power Concentration is a gain of 3-4% Base damage
See Dex/Int/Con 2 versus Dex/Ego/Con, done with both Kinetic Manipulation and AoPM. Same setup: 3x Vigilante and four Int or Ego mods. The extra additive damage worked out to 3-4% real damage, depending on passive, at a loss of 7-8 seconds of Active Offense cooldown time.
3. Primary End is kinda bad
No surprise there. The Bolstering Bracers-Vigilante Crit-Hospitable Eyepiece (BVH) combination, along with two Con and four Int mods, was used across all Primary stats with the exception of Primary Con, where six Int mods were used. End just ended up behind.
Outburst wasn’t used because Outburst is additive and conditional. Power Overwhelming provides a better damage boost while being able to be thrown into TBD-Stance for Defense.
Defensively, it’s not too bad with enough End, but the cost to DPS just can’t be bridged.
4. Between Str/Ego and Dex as a non-Form Secondary stat, additive bonus pulls ahead of crit by a hair.
See Primary Con with Kinetic Manipulation, Con/Int/Dex and Con/Int/Ego, BVH with II,II,II mods. Ego is better, but barely.
5. Primary Int may not be the best stat for stacking Int.
Most bosses, including Normal Lair bosses, sit at 20% Defense, most of which will be negated with a Depleted Uranium Core. Having Detect Vulnerability at high amounts will only be worthwhile for Elite Lair mobs, Fire and Ice and Forum Malvanum’s Duratok and Ironclad, the latter of which are usually Plasma Beamed anyway.
Considering that Detect Vulnerability is the only thing you get out of Int with Primary Int, along with the availability of Bolstering and Hospitable secondaries, other Primary stat trees could be more worthwhile for stacking Int.
6. Ironically, Primary Int is good for stacking Dex.
Look at the progression for Primary Int with Kinetic Manipulation with 93 Dex, then 219 Dex, then AoPM with 300 Dex. The trend that Int with Concentration actually gained DPS when transferring points from a Form stat (Int) to a non-Form stat (Dex), unlike Dex/Int/Con, means that the DPS gain is pretty huge.
Compare to End/Dex/Con and End/Ego/Con. A shift from 28 Dex to 342 Dex – 314 points’ difference, was a gain of 6.7% Crit. With Int/Dex/Con, a shift from 93 Dex to 217 Dex, or 128 points, led to a gain of 6.6% Crit.
7. Primary Con is good for stacking stats other than Con without losing EHP.
542 Int and 93 Dex, or 466 Dex and 170 Int with 17k EHP. ’nuff said.
8. Primary Juggernaut scaling is stupid.
Look at that EHP with just two Con mods!
9. Cryptic math is cryptic
With Vulnerability, 10% debuff = 9.77% more damage. With Expose Weakness, 10% debuff = 9.79% more damage. Even if there were diminishing returns, they seem to be diminishing however they feel like. Crit Damage numbers don’t completely tally with Offense and Crit Severity either.
Look at Ego/Dex/Con:
- 7,349 damage with 16% Offense
- That’d be 7,349 / 1.16 = 6,335.34 before Offense.
- Multiplied by 228.5% for crit = 1,4476.26.
- That doesn’t line up with the actual 14,680!
Most likely cause is Offense is rounded. But the debuff is still a mystery.
10. Primary Presence is a sleeper
In Tier 1, Grandeur lets Presence give a sizable Offense bonus to throw into the TBD-Stance loop. And then in Tier 2, increased Crit Chance along with a debuff on the level of Expose Weakness – Vulnerability, which is procced by Mental Storm. On targets with zero resistance, it manages to scrape close to the usual suspects Dexterity and Ego. Even without Vulnerability, Primary Presence still gives an impressive combination of Crit Chance and Defense on top of healing.
Endnote
A couple mistakes were made here. One was using the 16 Defense secondary instead of 338 HP – some stats may have their EHP underrepresented due to lower HP. The other was recording Quarry base stats instead of with Audacity, although the Sniper Rifle attack and crit numbers were taken with 8 stacks of form and 3 stacks of Audacity. Safe to say Quarry numbers should be higher.
Doesn’t account for AOs/ADs because it’s hard to be accurate with them. Ego Surge with Ego powering Conc for example will create a new Concentration stack with the boosted Ego. That builds up over the course of Ego Surge before dropping back down again when you gain Concentration stacks sans boosted Ego.
Special thanks to Championshewolf for generously providing the Hospitable Eyepiece and Barricade Bracers.
