Low level mech gameplay?

[ICountFrom0]

I understand what to do when I have ammo, every 30 seconds when I get to reload, but there's a few rotations between reloads.

When my "ammo" is out though, I flounder, I'm not entirely sure what to do, yes, I'm a fish out of water.

Split shot.

It starts here. Potency 160. In theory I could just keep using this until the next reload happens and not be too horribly behind. But if it triggers there's a +100 via additional effect to slug shot.

Slug shot. 100. If the effect carries over it's +100. It also claims that it itself is 200 with the effect. So is it 200, or is it 300? Does it increase AND get the bonus, or just one of those things but it's said in two places? It in itself has a chance to give the next clean shot a +140.

Clean Shot. 100. It claims to be 240 under bonus. If the bonus is additive to the increased base it's 380 potency, otherwise it's only 240 and this is again one bonus that's listed in two places instead of one, giving the false impression of two stacking bonuses.

I see options.

1. I change nothing. Split, Slug, Clean. Split, Slug, Clean. Over and over. Bonus triggers, bonus doesn't, just keep doing the rotation. Do it in your sleep.

2. I do nothing. Split, Split, Split, Split. 160 potency shots, over and over.

3. I follow the marks. Split. If split doesn't status, Split again. If split triggers, slug. 50% of the time when slug does not trigger, back to split. If slug triggers, clean, then back to split. All I have to do it not be brain dead, and I'll trigger as many specials as it lets me.

4. I rebel. Slug. When slug triggers Clean. Potency is 100 on slug, but 50% of the time clean does big damage. Since it's not a chain, I don't ever really have to touch split.

Though, if 4 is actually GOOD, maybe I should be doing 4 when I have a quick reload for a single "shot"?

[Kitfox]

MCH tooltips are pretty terrible.

Split Shot is 160.
Slug Shot is 200 with proc (only 100 without).
Clean Shot is 240 with proc (only 100 without).

Never use shots without procs. If you have none, just spam Split Shot until you get some.

[Rongway]

It's understandable how "X Shot Bonus Potency:" is confusing. It means, "This is the total potency of the attack when the previous shot triggered its proc"; not "This is bonus potency in addition to the base potency when the previous shot triggered its proc". Compare to ammo: "Ammunition effect: Increases current X Shot potency by 30"



Ammo no-proc Slug Shot (130 potency) + proc Clean Shot (240 potency) = 370 potency / 2 GCDs = 185 potency / GCD

no-ammo Split Shot (160) + ammo+proc Slug Shot (230) + proc Clean Shot (240) = 210/GCD
2x no-ammo Split Shot (160) + ammo+proc Slug Shot (230) + proc Clean Shot (240) = 197.5/GCD
3x no-ammo Split Shot (160) + ammo+proc Slug Shot (230) + proc Clean Shot (240) = 190
4x no-ammo Split Shot (160) + ammo+proc Slug Shot (230) + proc Clean Shot (240) = 185

So you can fail to get a proc on three Split Shots in a row and it would still be the same damage/GCD as skipping Split Shot and using QuickReload on Slug Shot. The probability of failing four procs in a row is 6.25%, so you have a 93.75% chance of doing at least that much. The probability of failing three procs in a row is 12.5%, so you have an 87.5% chance of doing better by starting with Split Shots. It's a little bit more complicated than that because you don't want to be sitting on Quick Reload forever, but that's the basic idea.



Have you considered doing 1-2-1-3-2 instead of 1-2-3? Ammo will give +30 potency to any shot, so let's ignore that part of the ammo effect for a moment--it doesn't matter which shots that gets applied to. The difference in which shots you use ammo on will be the forced procs in your 1-2-3. Since each shot already has a 50% chance to proc the bonus for the next shot, and a 50% chance that you'll have to go back to Split Shot, we'll attribute half the difference between Split Shot and the powered up Slug/Clean shots to ammo's effect. That means ammo is worth an additional 20 potency if you use it on Split Shot ((200-160)*0.5) or an additional 40 potency on Slug Shot ((240-160)*0.5), in addition to the +30 potency that any shot gets from ammo. So if QuickReload is almost ready, you can tweak your 123 to fish for an Enhanced Slug Shot to use with it.

[Kitfox]

snip

That is a very confusing way to think about the shot potencies and ammo. You should never hold Quick Reload or Reload, purely because of rotational reasons but I believe this to be true also for potency reasons.

Here's a simpler way to look at the potencies. The average potency of the shot combo is (160 x 4 + 200x 2 + 240) / 7 = ~183 (or 213 heated shots). Ammo increases the potency of the shot by 30 and the chance to get a proc by 50%. A proc increases the potency of the next shot by 40. Therefore Quick Reload is worth 30 + 40 x 0.5 = 50 potency, as long as it's used on Split Shot or Slug Shot to gain a proc. The reason why the proc gain is only 40 potency regardless if ammo is used on either of them, is because there is a base chance to get a proc anyway, so it's not really fair to compare the gains strictly to Split Shot. While it's true that the gain from Slug Shot to Clean Shot is greater than Split Shot to Slug Shot, there's a 50% opportunity cost associated with fishing for the Slug Shot so while the gain is twice as big, the opportunity cost of the initial Slug proc mitigates it completely. So when looking at the gain on average, it doesn't matter which one is used, and delaying the usage makes it a definite loss.

Delaying Quick Reload to fish for a Slug→Clean combination would cause a loss of at least one usage within the 60s loop when avoiding delaying other cooldowns and it would have to be worth more than completely missing out on that one usage. I really doubt this to be the case although I gave up trying to make a more accurate model out of the RNG trees.

Reload is worth three times that, but only if used without procs, in reality it's a bit less. The chance of having no procs loaded is 4 / 7 = ~57% as per the RNG distribution of the shots in vacuum, so 43% of the time when Reload becomes ready you will lose out on the proc potency on one of the ammos. All other proc scenarios besides the no-procs one lead to ammo being spent on Clean Shot. So the real worth of Reload is around 2 x 50 + 40 x 0.5 x 4 / 7 = ~141.

The reason why you can't delay Reload for a no-procs situation is again rotational, because you want to align all buffs for the Wildfire window and there's a very big chance that Reload would be delayed for multiple gcds, again delaying the burst window and the rest of the ogcds. This isn't worth it due to losing usages over the fight and missing the benefits of raid buff windows.

I'm sure it's possible make better and more accurate models for shots potencies, but I doubt it would change the optimal usage of the abilities simply because the timers align perfectly with burst windows only when used strictly on cooldown.

TL;DR: For general ammo usage outside of Wildfire sequence: Use Quick Reload ammo on either Split Shot or procced Slug Shot whenever the cooldown is ready. Use Reload ammo on Split Shot or procced Slug Shot when possible whenever the cooldown is ready and regardless of proc scenario. Only use ammo on Clean Shot if both procs are already loaded, it's the highest potency option when procs can't be gained.

[Seraphor]

This is why the best practice is 1 2 1 3 2 3, as you avoid spending ammo on Clean Shot and wasting a 40 potency proc.

Reload, Split, Slug, Split, Clean, Quick Reload, Slug, Clean.
Potentially a Reassemble before the final Clean Shot.

[Kitfox]

This is why the best practice is 1 2 1 3 2 3, as you avoid spending ammo on Clean Shot and wasting a 40 potency proc.

That is indeed the best scenario, but not the best practice, because as stated that scenario only happens about half the time. The best practice is to hit Reload on cd to keep it aligned with Wildfire and work with the proc scenario you have. The possible proc scenarios are no-procs, slug-proc and clean-proc. You generally shouldn't have both procs loaded at the same time before Reload outside of Wildfire preparation, but having both will lead to one ammo being wasted on Clean Shot all the same.

These are the efficient gcd patterns (split, slug and clean being 123 respectively):
- no procs: [Reload] 12132 (all ammo used to gain procs)
- slug proc: [Reload] 2132 OR 2312 (one ammo used on Clean Shot)
- clean proc: [Reload] 1323 OR 3123 (one ammo used on Clean Shot)
- both procs (unlikely): [Reload] 32132 (one ammo used on Clean Shot)

There's two different ways to handle Slug and Clean scenarios that result in the same total potency so you can pick your favorite. The three top patterns are basically how you want to work with your mid rotation Reload. The Reload used within Wildfire or to prep it works a bit differently because the main goal is to ensure a Reassembled Clean Shot within the burst window. The gcd order there similarly includes three possible scenarios and depends on the rotation you're using so I won't go into that in length. You can find more about lvl70 Wildfire scenarios here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...it?usp=sharing