Do Stalkers do more damage than Scrappers?

[Snarky]

I suppose this is a two-fold question.   I assume Stalkers do more 'burst' damage?  Which AT does more damage over a longer fight?  Are Stalkers more suited to big AV fights due to the sustainability of damage in a long fight or are Scrappers?

 

 

[SwitchFade]

Depends. Factors affecting results are,

 

Survivability

Recharge

Primary set in question

Damage type

Level range

 

Stalkers, on average, would most likely have slightly higher DPS at the high recharge end of the spectrum, sliding to equal as recharge lowers. Stalkers will see a wider swing in dps output alo g a curve, where scrappers would be a smoother, sustained output.

 

Survivability will play a key factor, certain secondaries on stalkers may not allow facetanking for long periods; insps run out, buffs drop, etc

 

Level will be a large factor, as a stalker at 35 and 50+ are different, whereas a scrap is a smoother evolutionary power curve.

 

If we were to average everything? Stalkers favored for ST by a small margin, scraps favored for AoE by a small margin.

 

If we drill down, certain combinations will be outliers.

[Galaxy Brain]

On the whole, if you were to compare each combo against each other (En/Ea, Claw/Ea, Claw/Regen, etc, etc) head to head, the Stalker will for sure have better ST on average due to Assassin's Focus + other tweaks, but as mentioned worse AoE on average too. They are also a *bit* squishier, but overall not by much.

[siolfir]

TL;DR answer:

 

They have a lower AT modifier (1.0 to 1.125), boost their own damage less (80% of Scrapper/Blaster effectiveness), get fewer AoE attacks for most sets, and lose out on any AoE damage auras and -resistance powers that are built into the sets for the other melee ATs...

 

...but they get criticals often enough and Assassin's Strike with Focus is actually better than fast Energy Transfer for DPA, so with the same investment and played well, they'll do as much or more single target damage using the same primary. But it's all situational.

[Xenosone]

Since everything runs away from my stalker to hit a controller down the street that may or may not have held a minion at any point in the controllers career my survivability is through the roof. 

Since everything runs away from my stalker....makes it hard to do tons of damage except from hide.

 

Energy aura is amazing on stalkers and since everything runs from my stalker i honestly believe regen could be nerfed again for stalkers till it healed the enemy and a regen stalker would still survive and make jack emmert seethe.

 

[Lightslinger]

Stalkers get base 10% chance to crit +3% per team member. On a full team I'd assume Stalkers pull quite a bit ahead.

Edited February 17, 2021 by Lightslinger

[SwitchFade]

2 hours ago, Xenosone said:

Since everything runs away from my stalker to hit a controller down the street that may or may not have held a minion at any point in the controllers career my survivability is through the roof. 

Since everything runs away from my stalker....makes it hard to do tons of damage except from hide.

 

Energy aura is amazing on stalkers and since everything runs from my stalker i honestly believe regen could be nerfed again for stalkers till it healed the enemy and a regen stalker would still survive and make jack emmert seethe.

 

Gone to the americans! BBQsauce

[EmperorSteele]

I know @Xenosone was being silly, but he brings up an interesring tidbit: Stalkers CAN emit a fear statis when they AS. This increases survivability, but can decrease DPS if the terrorized foes decide to run off. So there can be a bit of tradeoff there. Overall though, I don't think it has a huge effect, but just enough to be noteworthy.

[Snarky]

2 minutes ago, EmperorSteele said:

I know @Xenosone was being silly, but he brings up an interesring tidbit: Stalkers CAN emit a fear statis when they AS. This increases survivability, but can decrease DPS if the terrorized foes decide to run off. So there can be a bit of tradeoff there. Overall though, I don't think it has a huge effect, but just enough to be noteworthy.

My main is a Dark/Dark Brute.  I do run all 3 Aura toggles, allatime.  Dam/Fear/Stun.  Generally the fear they just cower and get the ghost skull on them.  Took me a while to get used to the stun though.  Certain mobs, you stun them, they just start staggering around like zombies on cocaine.  clueless, brainless, but making darned good speed!  I was like, wait! I havent killed you yet!  

 

The damage mitigation of Fear is real.  I am totally spitballing here but I am guessing it is about the same as knockdown.  Stops the mobs from attacking for one or two attacks.  everything adds up, buys time, etc

[Omega-202]

10 hours ago, EmperorSteele said:

I know @Xenosone was being silly, but he brings up an interesring tidbit: Stalkers CAN emit a fear statis when they AS. This increases survivability, but can decrease DPS if the terrorized foes decide to run off. So there can be a bit of tradeoff there. Overall though, I don't think it has a huge effect, but just enough to be noteworthy.

That's not what the AS effect does.  It applies a Fear (https://archive.paragonwiki.com/wiki/Fear) status which makes the target cower.  It DOES NOT make the target run away.  Fear has not done that since Issue 3.  Runners are a whole separate AI mechanism unrelated to the Fear effect.  Stalkers experience a high frequency of runners due to the low threat modifier (threat modifer x2), as compared to Tanks and Brutes (threat mod ×4) and Scrappers (threat modifier x3), and because they lack a taunt aura of any kind.  However, all of this has NOTHING to do with Fear or AS.  

 

Overall, there is a ton of misinformation in this thread, which is very dissappointing.  @siolfir and @Lightslinger are the only people who are actually sharing accurate information.  

 

In sum, once you get a solid attack chain down with both AT's ATOs slotted, a Stalker will usually put out more single target DPS than a Scrapper when in a full team due to the 31% crit chance (10% base + 3% per teammate, compared to the 5-10% for Scrappers; THANKS to Siolfr for catching my typo), nearly perma BU due to the Assassin's Mark ATO and guaranteed double crits from Guile ATO when using AS with 3-stacks of Assassin's Focus (100% crit chance) >ATO Hide proc> heavy hitter (100% crit from Hide).  A Stalker can reliably have 30-40% of their attack chain as crits off of scale 1.0 damage versus ~10% crits for a Scrapper off of scale 1.125, which usually puts them ahead.    

Edited February 18, 2021 by Omega-202
typo

[EmperorSteele]

I mean, that page you linked says the target will cower OR flee, so, how am I wrong?

 

That said, I've noticed less runners against my Stalker than against my Mind Controller after a blast of Terrorize, so, guess that just means the weakest Controller in the game is more intimidating than a powerful Stalker. Ouch!

[siolfir]

5 hours ago, Omega-202 said:

In sum, once you get a solid attack chain down with both AT's ATOs slotted, a Stalker will usually put out more single target DPS than a Scrapper when in a full team due to the 21% crit chance (10% base + 3% per teammate, compared to the 5-10% for Scrappers), nearly perma BU due to the Assassin's Mark ATO and guaranteed double crits from Guile ATO when using AS with 3-stacks of Assassin's Focus (100% crit chance) >ATO Hide proc> heavy hitter (100% crit from Hide).  A Stalker can reliably have 30-40% of their attack chain as crits off of scale 1.0 damage versus ~10% crits for a Scrapper off of scale 1.125, which usually puts them ahead. 

First off, thanks for the mention on accuracy.

 

Sadly, wanting to spread that accuracy means that I also need to nitpick a bit: Stalkers get a base 7% chance to critical + 3% per teammate, as you mentioned, but it's only nearby teammates (pretty sure the radius is 30'), and the Stalker is included. That gives them a 10-31% chance versus the 21% chance you stated, which was likely a typo given that you had the other numbers right, but I wanted to also bring up the radius so figured I may as well mention that, too. The Scrapper can also boost that ~10% you mention with ATOs. Long story short on this one, there's more to the story to get that higher rate than you brought up, but the overall conclusion holds true for single target damage: usually the Stalker is ahead, because they're running an attack chain with a much better attack that isn't available to Scrappers.

[Snarky]

For me it is all pretty academic.  On high end teams (or even exemplared to run Silver Mantis) my Dark/Dark Brute relies on Aoe  (Dark.....yes, AoE) to do most of the work until I hit an AV or EB.  It is just way more effective to be 'mass communicating' rather than ST cherry picking in a chaotic environment.

 

My Brutes learned a long time ago (partly because I am not a great player, partly because CoX is not great for specific targeting out of the box) that I will not get to pick who I fight.  I do more damage just killing what is near me and wandering towards where I hope is where the team wants me to be.  I keep chanting "Kill the one you're with" to the tune of "Love the one you're with"

 

I will be creating an Energy Melee / (prob Invul ) Stalker robot.  It will be a nod to the assassin robot in Star Wars 5 ...2....errrr the second, no, thats not right, the original Star Wars movie series..  IG-88s.  Friendly efficient little machines programmed to kill.  And doing as instructed they immediately killed their creators.  Succcess!  What has science done?!?

 

But while it will be tons of fun I am sure I sincerely doubt it will allow me to be as useful on a team or league as my Brutes.  And since I am already only moderately useful I need to stay focused!