Tank Stats Balancing Tool

Here is my Tank Stats Balancing Tool, a Windows program written to assist with dialing in the three tanking stats in Star Wars: The Old Republic.

The current version is Version 12, which is updated for game version 7.x and level-80 tank characters.

This program was originally written in the SWTOR version 3.0 timeframe as a way of making the detailed calculations of theorycrafters like KeyboardNinja and Dipstik (and later Goblin_Lackey and Vicadin) more accessible to everyone, but unfortunately there aren't any mathematicians on the level of KeyboardNinja or Dipstik still doing this work.

Because of this, the only still-useful part of this program is the Shield/Absorb balance calculation.

I do think that this is still useful, however, so here you go.  I definitely still use it myself.

If anyone has suggestions for changes or how to make this program better, please do let me know.  (Sadly, it really can't serve its original purpose any more.)

Click here to download TankTool.zip

So what does this do?

This program takes your current stats (which you type into the UI) and calculates the optimal balance of Shield and Absorb against each other, taking into account the underlying calculations for the stats and the minor variations between the tank classes.

The result is a basic recommendation for maximizing the overall amount of damage mitigated by your offhand shield, based on maximizing the result of the two percentages when multiplied together.

The values it recommends for Shield and Absorb will add up to the same total as your current values for Shield and Absorb, with the intention pointing out how much Absorb you should swap out for Shield (or vice-versa) in your current gear, whatever its current level.

Note that this completely ignores Defense, since it is not involved in the offhand shield calculations.

Why is this important?

Because most of the recommendations for gearing that you find on the net are basically someone's opinion, with no hard data to back it up.  This program's recommendations are based on cold hard math, and nothing else.

What exactly is it calculating?

Think of it like this:

Imagine you put nothing but Shield in your gear, with no Absorb at all.  Let's even go so far as to say that it's enough to make your Shield percentage go all the way up to 100% (which is impossible, but this is just an example). Your Absorb percentage, of course, is 0%.  In this situation, you'll mitigate NO DAMAGE WHATSOEVER, because even though your shield will trigger for every single attack, the amount of damage you take will still be the same, because it will absorb 0% of the damage.  This is no different from not having a shield at all.

Now imagine you go the other direction and go all-Absorb with no Shield at all.  Like before, lets assume this leads to an Absorb percentage of 100% (again, impossible) and a Shield percentage of 0% (which ignores the built-in 20% the shield item itself gives you but again, this is just an illustrative example).  In this situation, your 100% Absorb means that you'll take no damage at all when the shield activates, but it will never actually activate because of your 0% Shield.  Again, you'll mitigate NO DAMAGE WHATSOEVER and this, too, is no different from not having a shield at all.

Obviously, there is some point in between where your shield does trigger as often as possible and when it does you do absorb as much damage as possible.   This program finds that optimum middle-ground for you.

Another way to think of it:

Imagine trying to hit a baseball into the stands for a home run.  You need the ball to completely cover the distance to the outfield wall and then some.  Distance is key, but you also need enough height so that the ball is still high enough in the air that it clears that back wall when it gets there.

Your arms are only so strong and aren't going to get stronger just from one pitch to the next.

Where do you aim the ball when you hit it?

You won't hit the ball straight out in a line drive, because it'll just immediately drop to the ground and roll.  Even if it rolls all the way to the outfield, it never at any point had enough height to clear the back wall.

You also won't hit the ball straight up, because it'll never even come close to the back wall.  Instead, it'll just drop down right on your head with no distance at all, and be called foul (or caught by the catcher and then you're out).

Somewhere in the middle is the optimal angle (in fact, it's pretty much always very close to 45 degrees) that will give the ball the best combination of enough height to clear the back wall AND enough distance to get there.

In mathematics, "combination" translates to "multiplication", so we're looking for the maximum value we can get as the product of these two directions: up off the ground and towards the outfield.

Like the distance from the plate to where the ball lands is a combination of forward and upward momentum, the damage mitigated due to Shield and Absorb is a combination of those two stats.  The program hunts down the best possible combination (product) of the two percentages, assuming the sum stays the same--because you can't just arbitrarily raise your stats but you can swap pieces (enhancements, earpieces, augments) for the same amount of the opposite stat.

By knowing where you are and roughly how much you should swap in which direction, you have an excellent starting point for your gear.

How useful and practical is this?

While I make no claims that what this program recommends is the absolute optimal solution for every possible situation (because it really only takes a very few data points into account), I can say confidently that what it does calculate is accurate.  As such, it is a useful starting point for anyone setting up their gear for the first time.  There can and probably are reasons to skew higher one way or the other (for instance, if other damage-mitigating effects are triggered by a successful shield, then skewing for higher shield would be desirable).

Originally, the work done by KeyboardNinja, Dipstik, and others did actually take much more additional information into consideration, where the simple Shield/Absorb optimization does not.  As I wrote above, this program was originally created to make their work more accessible to people, but no one is doing that detailed work any more, so although this much simpler calculation is not nearly as good, it is the best thing that we do still have available.

So use it as a data point for setting up your tank gear.  It's not the be-all, end-all, but what it does, it does correctly.  The rest is up to you.

There's no charge or anything for using this, but I do ask that you not repost it on any other publicly-accessible site without getting permission first.  (You can always refer people to this page to download it themselves.)

What if I have a question, a suggestion for improvement, or found a bug?

Contact me either in-game with a mail message to Dianiss on the Star Forge server, or email Dianiss@Dianiss.net and I'll be happy to help.