In my opinion, Energy Melee. It has zero AOEs, all attacks are single target. With Total Focus and Energy Transfer, I dont think anything else can touch it.
Typical fight - Build up, AS, Energy Transfer (extreme damage) followed by Total Focus (extreme damage), dead boss.
I vote for Martial Arts. BU + AS and then Placate Eagle Claw. Not many bosses can survive that.
You've got 3 decent hitters in Crane, Cobra and Axe.
(If you don't care about not having any AoE)
PS: I find Kinetic Melee a very good mix of ST dps and one decent melee aoe. I wanted to try MA but I can't justify having all ST before lvl 44.
What's left is to normalize all Assassin Strikes and improve Stalker's old sets (Claw, MA and EM)! You don't need to bring back the missing PbAoE attack. You just need to make the existing ones better! For example, make Slice a WIDER and LONGER cone.
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Yea, I can see MA definitely being at the top for ST Damage, thanks to the buffs to the set. But Energy Melee, honestly, after running the numbers is no where near the top for ST Damage...oddly enough. I know this sounds funny, but it appears to me that its actually one of the LOWEST damaging ST sets out there...and it doesn't make up for it with AoE's or even fast activation times....I think EM might actually....need a buff...for Stalkers at least....wierd huh?|
Originally Posted by Jibikao
I vote for Martial Arts. BU + AS and then Placate Eagle Claw. Not many bosses can survive that.
You've got 3 decent hitters in Crane, Cobra and Axe. (If you don't care about not having any AoE) PS: I find Kinetic Melee a very good mix of ST dps and one decent melee aoe. I wanted to try MA but I can't justify having all ST before lvl 44. |
Anyways, from the independant testing I've done, and a bit of crunching, I've actually found Dark Melee and Martial Arts to be "the best" in Single Target Damage. MA was only "slightly" more damage than DM, by about 47 pts of damage....however, due to MA's purely smashing damage component vs. DM's large quantities of much "less resisted" damage type (negative energy) I would have to assume that DM could easily make up the less than 50 pt. damage difference needed to match MA in damage. In fact, I would have to assume that in most circumstances DM would easily exceed MA's damage, thanks to that.
Conclusion, so far at least, would be that would appear to me as though Dark Melee was king in ST Damage for Stalkers, with Martial Arts coming up as a close second place. Elec Melee was actually up there as well, ranking around third or fourth place, in my testing, and ElecMelee gets some decent AoE too.
Anyways, I'd still like people's personal opinions on this matter, as actual in-game-experience with something while leveling can sometimes say more than paper crunching.
Thanks!
I agree that even if MA edges out DM a bit, DM is still superior due to tohit debuff, healing and fear. That's why I didn't make MA Stalker. I made MA Scrapper instead because MA's lack of any AoE is still not justified (yet). MA's ST damage is the best but if Dark Melee's Shadow Maul can hit two targets, it beats MA.
And MA is all smashing. Smashing is not as heavily resisted as Lethal but it is still better to have some energy or negative energy.
I've only tried Energy Assault on Dom. I am not a big fan of EM to be honest.
What's left is to normalize all Assassin Strikes and improve Stalker's old sets (Claw, MA and EM)! You don't need to bring back the missing PbAoE attack. You just need to make the existing ones better! For example, make Slice a WIDER and LONGER cone.
By the way, I heard that Ninja Blade with set bonuses and procs is very good too. Did you do test on Ninja Blade?
Right now, I would stick with Kinetic Melee just because its ST damage isn't bad and it has one range and one pbaoe. 
And it has some stuns, knockdowns and damage debuffs which not many powers can do.
What's left is to normalize all Assassin Strikes and improve Stalker's old sets (Claw, MA and EM)! You don't need to bring back the missing PbAoE attack. You just need to make the existing ones better! For example, make Slice a WIDER and LONGER cone.
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I believe every Stalker primary can take down a boss critter (ignoring resistance) within one BU cycle, except maybe Spines (and even so, it would be asininely close, along with killing most of the minions/what-not in the group). Bosses at level 50 have roughly 2500 health and usually each set has the capability to deal 2000 or more damage of that total through BU+AS+Placate+[crit heavy hitter].
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Originally Posted by DarkMaster
I'm looking for any suggestions, even "non-burst" dps builds might work, although I'd really like to be able to end the fight with a Boss as quickly as Stalkerly possible, like within 10 seconds.
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Blue: ~Knockback Squad on Guardian~
Red: ~Undoing of Virtue on [3 guesses]~
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The best my calculations showed that a masterfully slotted nin/elec/lev stalker was probably the highest, although I'd rather not say the dps I calculated it as |
Originally Posted by Jibikao
By the way, I heard that Ninja Blade with set bonuses and procs is very good too. Did you do test on Ninja Blade?
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. That is, however, dependent on a lot of factors, like my estimation of the pet's damage (and the pet actually surviving). Using Placate and AS seemed to hurt the dps, as well as reduce the number of chances for those all-important Achilles procs to go off. Also the scrapper version of that combo does a lot better... which is why I switched over to that once PPP's became available for scraps.I'd tell you in practice how much dps the latter does, except I started focusing on two other builds that can do mid 400's dps
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What builds are those? Blasters?
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Originally Posted by Microcosm
The best my calculations showed that a masterfully slotted nin/elec/lev stalker was probably the highest, although I'd rather not say the dps I calculated it as
. That is, however, dependent on a lot of factors, like my estimation of the pet's damage (and the pet actually surviving). Using Placate and AS seemed to hurt the dps, as well as reduce the number of chances for those all-important Achilles procs to go off. Also the scrapper version of that combo does a lot better... which is why I switched over to that once PPP's became available for scraps.I'd tell you in practice how much dps the latter does, except I started focusing on two other builds that can do mid 400's dps |
In order to reach those levels of damage you have to be able to leverage significant amounts of -resistance. One of the builds is a controller (which I just started) and the other is a bane.
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I see, so not 400 dps per say, but the equivalent of 400 dps...
Ill/Rad troller?
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I suspect it's a /Cold. Stacked Sleet (-30% Res, summon lasts 15 seconds, applies debuff that lasts for 30 seconds so in theory at high recharge can inflict -90% res) + Heat Loss (-30% Res) + Benumb (-500% Regen) with bonus points for Mace Mastery's Poisonous Ray (-18.8% Res) plus the Toxic Tarantula pet. Controllers also get fairly good numbers for Assault (+15% damage) which will work on their own pets plus the Patron pet.|
Originally Posted by Beelzy
I see, so not 400 dps per say, but the equivalent of 400 dps...
Ill/Rad troller? |
Primary I'm not so sure about, but Illusion (PA + SW, sadly Phantasm's slightly retarded) or Fire (Imps + Char + Hotfeet) would be a safe bet for high damage output.
I'm a bit unsure of the Bane idea. Banes certainly get a lot of -res (Surveillance -20%, Shatter Armor -20%, Venom Grenade -20%/-40%, Poisonous Ray can take the Achilles' proc, Crowd Control can take the Fury of the Gladiator Proc), but you need to spam them fairly regularly as they only last 20 seconds (VG is worse at 16 secs), and Venom Grenade causes redraw and Surveillance does no damage which means a significant loss in DPS.
Conversely, Crabs get nearly as much -res (Venom Grenade -20%/-40%, Shatter Armor -20%, Channelgun and Longfang can take the Achilles' Proc, Arm Lash can take the Achilles Proc AND the Fury of the Gladiator Proc) but it doesn't have redraw on Venom Grenade, only Shatter armor (which does good damage and doesn't need to be spammed as often as VG) and three more pets than the Bane. I work out a Bane topping out at about 335 DPS, and a Crab at about 440 DPS - the Spiderlings alone add well over 100 DPS if you can keep them in melee.
That's all Raw DPS + Resistance debuffs though. Neither Banes or Crabs get any regen debuffs... so a /Cold will therefore be better against virtually any single hard target if there are no outside sources of -regen. Another contender could possibly be a Fire/Psi/Mace Dominator (due to Drain Psyche's -regen debuff being enhanceable, plus four pets and Poisonous Ray giving around 330 DPS before Drain Psyche is even taken into account).
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Surveillance is a toggle so its not going to effect DPS. It can also be slotted with the Achilles proc.| Surveillance does no damage which means a significant loss in DPS. |
With Surveillance you can see what the mobs -resistance is at, that can help a small bit with having to spam so many powers.
I'll have to admit I didn't realize you could get anywhere near the DPS you're getting with you bane and crab.
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Did they change this? |
Originally Posted by warden_de_dios
Surveillance is a toggle so its not going to effect DPS. It can also be slotted with the Achilles proc.
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I'll admit to not owning a Bane, but last I checked surveillance was a single-target click debuff which had a 20 second duration. It does indeed take the Achilles proc, but if it is a non-damaging click - rather than a toggle - you'd not want to spam it regularly.
I'm wrong its a click with a 20 sec timer. I got confused with Power Analayzer.
My bad my bad
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Ding ding ding ding ding! We have a winner!|
Originally Posted by Maelwys
I suspect it's a /Cold. Stacked Sleet (-30% Res, summon lasts 15 seconds, applies debuff that lasts for 30 seconds so in theory at high recharge can inflict -90% res) + Heat Loss (-30% Res) + Benumb (-500% Regen) with bonus points for Mace Mastery's Poisonous Ray (-18.8% Res) plus the Toxic Tarantula pet. Controllers also get fairly good numbers for Assault (+15% damage) which will work on their own pets plus the Patron pet.
Primary I'm not so sure about, but Illusion (PA + SW, sadly Phantasm's slightly retarded) or Fire (Imps + Char + Hotfeet) would be a safe bet for high damage output. I'm a bit unsure of the Bane idea. Banes certainly get a lot of -res (Surveillance -20%, Shatter Armor -20%, Venom Grenade -20%/-40%, Poisonous Ray can take the Achilles' proc, Crowd Control can take the Fury of the Gladiator Proc), but you need to spam them fairly regularly as they only last 20 seconds (VG is worse at 16 secs), and Venom Grenade causes redraw and Surveillance does no damage which means a significant loss in DPS. Conversely, Crabs get nearly as much -res (Venom Grenade -20%/-40%, Shatter Armor -20%, Channelgun and Longfang can take the Achilles' Proc, Arm Lash can take the Achilles Proc AND the Fury of the Gladiator Proc) but it doesn't have redraw on Venom Grenade, only Shatter armor (which does good damage and doesn't need to be spammed as often as VG) and three more pets than the Bane. I work out a Bane topping out at about 335 DPS, and a Crab at about 440 DPS - the Spiderlings alone add well over 100 DPS if you can keep them in melee. That's all Raw DPS + Resistance debuffs though. Neither Banes or Crabs get any regen debuffs... so a /Cold will therefore be better against virtually any single hard target if there are no outside sources of -regen. Another contender could possibly be a Fire/Psi/Mace Dominator (due to Drain Psyche's -regen debuff being enhanceable, plus four pets and Poisonous Ray giving around 330 DPS before Drain Psyche is even taken into account). |
Ill/cold/mace for the controller for all the reasons listed. Before you could get PPPs it would not have surpassed the bane, but with an extra pet and yet another source of -res it should hit somewhere much, much higher.
I think you have your bane and crab numbers backwards there, as ~430 is what I calculated for my bane a while ago. (Using Crowd Control to get the FotG proc to go off would be a big waste of dps, btw). What is the chain you are calculating? Mine is Surveillance->Venomnade->Shatter Armor->Poisonray-> Shatter-> Pulverize -> Poisonray -> Shatter -> Pulverize, throwing in Buildup when it won't cause redraw. The last crab build I checked was somewhere in the 350s I think.
Not that I'm still working on that, cause the controller has me salivating. Plus the controller has a better chance of keeping the pets alive.
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First off, Yay, I got the combo right! |
Originally Posted by Microcosm
I think you have your bane and crab numbers backwards there, as ~430 is what I calculated for my bane a while ago. (Using Crowd Control to get the FotG proc to go off would be a big waste of dps, btw). What is the chain you are calculating? Mine is Surveillance->Venomnade->Shatter Armor->Poisonray-> Shatter-> Pulverize -> Poisonray -> Shatter -> Pulverize, throwing in Buildup when it won't cause redraw. The last crab build I checked was somewhere in the 350s I think.
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Concerning the build, perhaps I'm factoring in too much redraw time, but I make that chain you quoted a hair under 21 seconds, which means that Venom Grenade's debuff in particular would have expired a good 5 seconds before it ends. The Chain I was looking at was Pulverise --> Shatter Armor --> Crowd Control --> Poisonous Ray --> Venom Grenade --> Surveillance --> Poisonous Ray which works out at a hair over 16 seconds... on the grounds that my build's Crowd Control at 141 DPA + Proc was better than Shatter at 153 DPA without a Proc. All together my Bane build puts out around 107 "Raw" DPS (before res debuffs) and 190 "Inflicted" DPS (after res debuffs).
With your chain using my build I make it 120 "Raw" DPS total from the Bane itself. Assuming you managed to get your resistance debuffs up slightly more often than mine (mine's in the high -70%'s), that's an average of about -80% Resistance debuffs constantly applied, meaning 120 "Raw" DPS becomes 215 "inflicted DPS" from the Bane. Call Reinforcements Pets each inflict a little over 11 unslotted DPS in melee range (or 9 DPS at range), Summon Blaster inflicts a hair over 15 unslotted DPS at range (12 DPS in melee). Assuming optimum conditions (-80% res applied, +30% damage from tactics, +96% Damage from pet slotting, Call Reinforcements Pets in melee, Blaster Pet at Range, No pause to resummon pets) that would rise to a total of 92 DPS from the Call Reinforcements Pets, and 61 DPS from the Blaster. In my own build I assumed Pets would get less benefit from the Resistance debuffs as they inflict no Toxic Damage... but I'll assume they get the full -80% here for simplicity's sake. That gives 215+92+61= about 368 "inflicted DPS" under optimal conditions.
The Crab build I'm using runs a Channel Gun --> Shatter Armor --> Channel Gun --> Arm Lash --> Channel Gun --> Venom Grenade --> Channel Gun --> Arm Lash chain, which works out at a bit over 16 seconds. Due to the regular -20% Procs it puts out an average of around 55.5% -Res, and the Crab itself has an "inflicted DPS" of just over 171 - less than the Bane, true. The Spiderling pets add 13 unslotted DPS in melee (three spiderlings, so using same rules as above for the Bane with 55.5% -Res, this equates to a bit over 136 "inflicted DPS" - though you'll need to adjust this down slightly as they are -2 to most foes. I have the "Chance for Build Up" Purple Proc in them which goes off fairly regularly and roughly cancels out the effect of the level difference). Call reinforcements and Summon Blaster are similar to the Bane, albiet at 55.5% res instead of 80% - working out at 79 and 53 DPS respectively. 79+53+136+171= about 439 "inflicted DPS" under optimal conditions.
It's quite possible that my Pet DPS values are incorrect and that is what's causing the difference. When calculating the two builds I approximated Pet DPS by adding up the Damage/(Cast Time + Recharge) of each different attack over time for both "melee" and "ranged" modes for each pet. It's hard to get an exact calculation on Pet DPS, but it's fairly certain that they'll tend to spam short-range attacks then they're in melee and long-range attacks when they're far away... especially since pets tend to be locked into one of the two "prefer melee" or "prefer range" modes and stay there cycling the appropriate attacks.
Apologies for the wall of text... it looks considerably tidier on my spreadsheet!
I'm going with "hell no" to MA. Even if it does come out with the best theoretical ST DPS the damage will be hugely worse in-game vs hard PvE targets. Virtually all of those targets have serious s/l resists and having an AS that's pure s/l is just painfully bad compared to those with other damage types. Voice of experience here.
Is there a tool for measuring DPS? Or is it all meta based on build, slotting and recharge times etc?
Are there any good in game utilities like with wow?
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Generally the Rikti pylon test is used. How much time it takes to take down a Rikti pylon...|
Originally Posted by _Zep_
Is there a tool for measuring DPS? Or is it all meta based on build, slotting and recharge times etc?
Are there any good in game utilities like with wow? |
(38343.75/time)+127.8125=DPS
38,343.75 is the amount of HP a Rikti pylon has (adjusted for resists) and 127.8125 is their regen rate (adjusted for resists).
So, your DPS rate using this measure is actually your dpsx0.8 (Rikti Pylons have 20% resistance I believe) adjusted for -res procs and -reg procs. So, a troller with high -reg or -res will be able to beat a Rikti pylon fast enough that their equivalent DPS is about 400. In other words, they can down a pylon in 2m20s...
The reason I was guessing rad was because Lingering is a toggle, thus does not decrease DPS, AccMet increases damage and recharge (for you and your pets) and the secondary as a whole improves your survivability as compared to cold.
Sorry, I know it's a little FotMy, but that's because it is such a great combo...
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Bolded part is incorrect. |
Originally Posted by Beelzy
The reason I was guessing rad was because Lingering is a toggle, thus does not decrease DPS, AccMet increases damage and recharge (for you and your pets) and the secondary as a whole improves your survivability as compared to cold.
Sorry, I know it's a little FotMy, but that's because it is such a great combo... |
Lingering Radiation is a click power. If you meant to say Enervating Field you would have been correct. If you actually DID mean Lingering Rad, it would be very very wrong.
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Originally Posted by Dechs Kaison See, it's gems like these that make me check Claws' post history every once in a while to make sure I haven't missed anything good lately. |
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What Claws said. |
Originally Posted by Beelzy
The reason I was guessing rad was because Lingering is a toggle, thus does not decrease DPS, AccMet increases damage and recharge (for you and your pets) and the secondary as a whole improves your survivability as compared to cold.
Sorry, I know it's a little FotMy, but that's because it is such a great combo... |
Also:
(i) Rad's main resistance debuff can't stack with itself like Cold's can. Sleet is a Psuedopet, and each instance of it is treated as a seperate caster.
(ii) Pets aren't affected by recharge buffs/debuffs anymore. AM would buff their damage, but not their power recharge times.
(iii) Rad is really only a FoTM because of its utility on the "FRad" teams. These can hit a lot of caps simultaneously (such as the foe -ToHit/-Resist/-Damage/-Recharge caps and the ally +Damage/+Recharge caps) due to all the stacking of different types of buff/debuff powers Rad has, combined with the stacked combo of Hotfeet/Choking Cloud.
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My bad... Also, was unaware of the +rech nerf against /rad...|
Originally Posted by ClawsandEffect
Bolded part is incorrect.
Lingering Radiation is a click power. If you meant to say Enervating Field you would have been correct. If you actually DID mean Lingering Rad, it would be very very wrong. |
I understand that the -res of cold is better than that of rad, but to what extent does that affect dps?
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Lets say you have an attack. |
Originally Posted by Beelzy
My bad... Also, was unaware of the +rech nerf against /rad...
I understand that the -res of cold is better than that of rad, but to what extent does that affect dps? |
It hits a foe for 100 Damage.
(i) You slot the attack, with three SOs, granting +95% Damage.
The Attack now hits a foe for 195 Damage.
(ii) You now get a +20% Damage Buff.
The Attack now hits the foe for (95+20=115) 215 Damage.
(iii) You lose the Damage Buff, and inflict a -20% Resistance debuff.
The Attack now hits the foe for (195*1.2) 234 Damage.
As you can see: Resistance Debuffs are multiplicative, and Damage Buffs are additive.
And Resistance Debuffs also affect your teammates' or pets' damage output.
Altogether this means that stacking a lot of Resistance Debuffs goes a long way to ramping up your damage output. A Rad Defender can put out -30% resistance. A Cold Defender with enough recharge can theoretically put out -120%. (Plus a bit more with Procs... but let's keep this simple) That's the equivalent of multiplying all damage inflicted against a foe by 2.2
Hey everyone, the title says it all. I'm wondering what everyone's opinion (or numbercrunching results) are for which Stalker Primary would offer me the most damaging single target takedown ability, for PvE. I know, I know, it's better to have a decent mix of AoE for teaming, but that's not my focus. For some reason...I just really wanna put a serious hurt to bosses/EB's while I'm teamed. I want to do it with a Stalker and I want to flatline my victim just as quickly as possible. As far as secondaries go, I think any will do, as long as they can help me survive long enough to take down my intended targets without faceplanting too quickly.
Anyways, I'm just really looking for the most damage a Stalker primary could put out on a single target, and possibly within the shortest amount of time. I'm looking for any suggestions, even "non-burst" dps builds might work, although I'd really like to be able to end the fight with a Boss as quickly as Stalkerly possible, like within 10 seconds. I'd rather not have to draw it out for 30 seconds simply because I'll slightly edge out ahead of other primaries in the 30+ seconds timeframe.
Any thoughts? Thanks!