Posted by Kray in Fully Operational | 30 Comments

“Now witness the firepower of this fully armed and operational battle station!” — There is no better example of damage in the Star Wars galaxy than the scene attached to that quote. Each week in Fully Operational, join Kray as he takes a look at the damage dealing role in Star Wars: The Old Republic. And yes, we’ll blow up a planet if we get the chance.

Folks, we’ve got a lot to talk about today, so I’m just going to leave this here and get right to it.

Star Wars: The Old Republic will begin early access next week (woo!), and as people begin to roll new characters in a new game they’ll be wondering exactly how they should be gearing up. This guide will explain the functions of all of the different stats in TOR (and there are a lot.) As far as what specs want what, that’s a bit murkier, but by reading through today’s post you should be able to get a basic handle on things. I’m not going to get too heavy into what the stats are, take this as a quick reference sheet.

The Primary Stats

There are six primary stats that you’ll find on gear and weaponry which affect your characters the most. These stats provide multiple bonuses instead of a single increase, and (depending on spec) may have up to 5 different effects for a single point. To sum it up, each stat has multiple effects, and certain ACs and classes get additional bonus effects.

Strength – Increases Melee Damage + Melee Crit

Jedi Knight/Sith Warrior Bonus – Force Damage + Force Crit

Willpower – Increases Force Damage + Force Crit

Jedi Shadow/Sith Assassin Bonus – Melee Damage + Melee Crit

Jedi Sage/Sith Sorcerer Bonus – Healing Power

Aim – Increases Ranged Damage + Ranged Crit

Vanguard/Powertech Bonus – Tech Damage + Tech Crit

Commando/Mercenary Bonus – Tech Damage + Tech Crit + Healing Power

Cunning – Increases Tech Damage + Tech Crit

Gunslinger/Sniper Bonus – Ranged Damage + Ranged Crit

Scoundrel/Operative Bonus – Ranged Damage + Ranged Crit + Healing Power

Endurance – Increases health

Presence – Increases companion damage, companion health, and companion healing

The Power Stats

When you see those primary stats above increasing damage or healing, they’re only part of the equation. When you mouseover your character’s melee/force/ranged/tech damage, you’ll see it’s bumped up by both “damage”, yielded by the primaries, and one or two “power” stats, of which there are three. This is different from World of Warcraft in the sense that your primary stats do -not- modify your power stats, but rather are completely separate. Tech/force/power can be found on gear such as weapons and foci/shields.

Power – Generic stat that increases the damage (and healing!) of all of your abilities, regardless of type.

Tech Power – Increases only abilities considered “tech,” such as grenades or flamethrowers.

Force Power – Increases only abilities considered “force,” such as Telekinetic Throw or Shock.

Healing Power (Tech and Force) – This is actually split up into Healing Power: Tech and Healing Power: Force, but for all intents and purposes they’re the same. Increases the amount healed by all of your healing abilities.

The Secondary Stats

A staple of any MMO’s gearing process is having big powerful primary stats followed by the less powerful but more varied secondary stats, and Star Wars: The Old Republic is no exception.

Accuracy Rating – Increases your chance to hit with all attacks. Keep in mind there are separate caps for different types of attacks. If you go over 100% hit, the additional percentage is converted into defense penetration!

Critical Rating – Increases your chance to score a critical hit with all heals and attacks.

Surge Rating – Increases critical bonus damage with all heals and attacks. The default bonus is 50% extra damage/heals on a crit, which this rating improves.

Alacrity Rating – Decreases activation time for all abilities. This includes both casted abilities and channeled abilities.

Edit: Thanks to Saravi for pointing out in the comments that Alacrity Rating does indeed decrease the global cooldown, making the stat worth something for melee or instant-cast characters.

The Gear-Defining Stats

Due to the extreme amount of gear customization in TOR, developers want you to be able to take any orange item (orange = fully moddable) and use it all the way to max level if you prefer. In order to achieve this, weapons and armor both have a dynamic stat on them which changes based on the level of the mods you have placed inside the item.

Rating – Increases the damage done on a weapon. You’ll see this listed at the very top of a lightsaber or blaster’s tooltip. The stat itself does absolutely nothing except increase the damage done — think of it as the ‘item level’ stat you’re used to seeing in games like World of Warcraft.

Armor – Armor, which you should be more familiar with, increases Energy and Kinetic resistances (more on that later), is the dynamic stat increased on pieces of equipped gear.

So, for an example, if you take an orange lightsaber with all level 1 mods in it, compared to the same lightsaber with all level 10 mods in it, the Rating stat will be much higher, and thus so will it’s damage. Same goes for Armor on those pieces with Armor on them.

The (Singular) PvP Stat

Conveniently enough, BioWare has condensed all the necessary PvP stats into one gigantic unit.

Expertise – Increases damage/healing done and decreases damage taken in PvP situations.

I’m not entirely sure what’s defined as a PvP situation, but I would imagine it’s damage done/taken to/from other characters, or healing someone who has recently taken damage from another player. Expertise is a jack-of-all-trades stat, it helps everything a little bit.

The Defensive Stats

I know, I know, this is a DPS column, but I have to include these stats in here just in case some of you care about survivability.

Resistance – There are 4 types of resistance in the game. Energy and Kinetic Resistance are affected by Armor as well as specific resistance stats, whereas Internal and Elemental resistance are only affected by their stats.

Defense Rating – Increases chance to parry melee attacks and deflect ranged attacks.

Shield Chance – For those who equip a shield in their offhand slot, increases the chance for an attack to be partially absorbed by your shield.

Absorption Rating – Increases the amount of damage reduced when an attack is shielded.

Phew – I think that just about covers everything. Most of these stats should be pretty familiar, specifically things like armor and crit, but it’s good to take a look over everything to help out your gearing needs. Keep an eye out soon for my mega-gigantor-uber post detailing the playstyles and general rotations of each of the DPS specs available to us at launch. Until next time, stay frosty!



