Merc Bounty Hunter / Commando Trooper DPS Guide

[H3ll]

While waiting for my EGA invite i decided to write a guide for Mercenary Bounty Hunters and Commando Troopers, which are essentially the same, to help my fellow BH/Troopers.

Please notice this thread is still WIP and it is mostly based on theorycrafting rather than on experience (only played BH untill early 30's during the beta) But the info here should be pretty accurate

Out of the 2 available DPS specs Arsenal (Bounty Hunter) / Gunnery (Trooper) is clearly the best, Pyrotech/Assault Specialist is the obvious PvP tree. Since this is thread is focussed on DPS i'll focus on the 1st mentioned trees. For the rest of the guide i'll use the Bounty Hunter as example, you can find the resembling talents for the Trooper on a site like http://knotor.com.


Abilities


This list only include the dps abilities that will be used, not survival, healing etc.


High Velocity Gas Cylinder - Cylinders are comparable to stances in wow, which means you can have only 1 active. The gas cylinder gives additional armor penetration and with the improvements from multiple talents its the obvious choice.
Tracer Missle - Your primary attack. It stacks armor penetration, as well as buffing your Rail Shots. With talents this becomes a very heat efficient, with decent damage and no cooldown!
Heartseeker Missile - A very high damage ability with a 15s cooldown. You want to use this as soon as its off CD and ur at 5 stacks of tracer missles.
Unload - A 3 sec channeled ability with a 15s cd. It has pretty decent DPS by default, but with a Barrage proc it's without a doubt a strong ability.
Rail shot - Also a fairly strong ability with a 15s cd and has a very low heat costs.
Rapid Shots - The filler ability. Costs no heat but has very low damage.


Talent Build


Arsenal

Tier 1
Mandalorian Iron Warheads - Required
Integrated Systems - Next to useless
Ironsights - Required

Tier 2
Stabilizers - Required
Muzzle Fluting - Required
Upgraded Arsenal - Required
Custom Enviro Suit - Optional / Recommended

Tier 3
Power Barrier - Required (if you skip this one you better stop playing)
Afterburners - Optional
Tracer Missile - Required
Target Tracking - Required

Tier 4
Jet Escape - Optional
Light 'Em Up - Required
Termal Velocity - Required

Tier 5
Pinning Fire - Optional
Riddle - Required
Tracer Lock - Required
Kolto Vents - Optional / Recommended

Tier 6
Barrage - Required
Power Overrides - Optional / Recommended

Tier 7
Heartseeker Missle - Required


Bodyguard

Tier 1
Improved Vents - Optional / Recommended
Med Tech - Avoid it
Hired Muscle - Required

Tier 2
Empowered Scans - You aren't a healer
Surgical Precision System - Same as above
Supercharged Gas - Useless
Critical Reaction - Optional


Firebug

Tier 1
Advanced Targeting - Optional / Recommended
System Calibrations - Optional
Integrated Cardio Package - Optional

Tier 2
Superheated Gas - Useless
Sweltering Heat - Useless
Gyroscopic Alignment Jets - Optional


The spec i'll be using myself: 5/31/5



Stat Priorities


Down here you can find the list with stat priorities, listed from most important to least important. I also added a short description of what the stat exactly does.

Aim - Your primary stat that increases damage, much like strength, agility and intellect in wow.
Accuracy - Basicly hit rating untill you reach 100%, and then turns into armor/spel penetration. Loses value after you reach 100%
Crit - Increases critical strike chance
Power - Increases melee, ranged, force and tech damage
Tech Power - Increases tech damage (found on weapons)
Surge - Increases crit damage, might become more usefull with higher crit rates.
Alacrity - Haste

Presence - Increases companion health, damage and healing, only usefull while leveling or doing solo content.

I listed Alacrity last because all it essentially does is making more room to add in an additional Rapid Shots once in a while, which is nothing but a poor filler. That means the DPS increase is minimal and not worth it.


Rotations


Before discussing the the rotations there is one very important thing that i should notice. The more heat you got, the slower it cools down. That means you dont want to go all-out, you will need to manage your heat to optimize DPS.

Here is a table of how heat regenerates:


At the start of a fight you can start nuking untill you reach 60 heat. At that point activate vent heat and then start managing your heat. You should try to stay below 30 heat, but if a long CD ability is ready don't wait to long and activate it. Try not to go over 40 heat though, unless vent heat is ready.


Merc/Com uses a priority system rather than a rotation, and is highly dependable on Buffs and Debuffs.
These are the general rules, followed in the same order as below. If the statement is false or the ability is on CD go to the next step.

1. Heat over 30 > Rapid Shots
2. Heat Signature debuff stacked up 5 times > Heartseeker Missile
3. Target Lock stacked up 5 times > Rail Shot
4. Barrage Procced > Unload
5. If none of the above is true use Tracer Missile

[vizzle]

Great guide, thanks for this!

[dornhan17]

Very good guide. Will definitely help with folks trying to figure out the way to build this class.

[Tigercat]

Scumbag guide writer

Says guide is for Mercs/Commandos, uses only Merc terminology with no translation.


I'm kidding, mostly. Only slight difference is between heat and ammo.

Skill(talent for you fresh converts) build is approved. All I do different is dropping the health regen on vent heat(recharge cells) in favor of a point in what's called Jet Escape for mercs.

[Wildcard23]

nice guide!

[H3ll]

Scumbag guide writer

Says guide is for Mercs/Commandos, uses only Merc terminology with no translation.


I'm kidding, mostly. Only slight difference is between heat and ammo.

Skill(talent for you fresh converts) build is approved. All I do different is dropping the health regen on vent heat(recharge cells) in favor of a point in what's called Jet Escape for mercs.

I might add commando terminology later today
Personally i chose for health regen on vent heat talent for heavy AoE situations in PvE, that seemed slightly more usefull to me than Jet Escape

[Deleted]

Sticky please, very helpful.

[Primalthirst]

Or you could read a full, theory-crafted guide at http://sithwarrior.com/forums/Thread...DPS-Compendium

[H3ll]

Or you could read a full, theory-crafted guide at http://sithwarrior.com/forums/Thread...DPS-Compendium

Holy shit balls, that guide looks A LOT like mine o.O

EDIT: I noticed a noticable difference, that guide seems to prefer Rail Shot over Heartseeker Missile and differend heat levels :P

[iCandy]

Use this as a visual guide to the OP's post on what spec to use.
http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#300McZMIkroMdRkfzZf.1

Pinning Shot was a tough choice but honestly I can see it helping in PVE situations more than anything else that is unmarked in the Arsenal tree.

You might say, well aren't afterburners better? Well if you ever played a melee tank/dps in WoW and you had some dumb druid or shaman come up and knock all the mobs out of your range then you'll realize how much this ability will be hated. Then again it could be useful on some fights..we'll have to wait and see.

[H3ll]

Use this as a visual guide to the OP's post on what spec to use.
http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#300McZMIkroMdRkfzZf.1

Pinning Shot was a tough choice but honestly I can see it helping in PVE situations more than anything else that is unmarked in the Arsenal tree.

You might say, well aren't afterburners better? Well if you ever played a melee tank/dps in WoW and you had some dumb druid or shaman come up and knock all the mobs out of your range then you'll realize how much this ability will be hated. Then again it could be useful on some fights..we'll have to wait and see.

If unload was spammable it might be worth it, but since it isnt i prefer Afterburners since it might safe the healers ass or prevent a wipe. Either way, none of them really makes a huge difference, that is why i listed them as optional, its just a matter of personal preference.

Also, there was a link to the build below the talents already

[devidoll]

Heat last I checked was as followed. I'll check again once servers come up but if you mouse over your heat bar it will say # heat per second

0-39 - Heat dissipates at 5/sec
40-79 - Heat dissipates at 3/sec
80-100 - Heat dissipates at 2/sec


At the moment rail shot is bugged and does not benefit from the talent "Tracer Lock"