Alacrity in SWTOR is a tertiary stat that effects the speed at which you can execute abilities, how quick your casts and channels are, and lowers the cooldown of most skills. If you want to know about alacrity breakpoints and recommendations for the current update, refer to the most current Alacrity Breakpoint article.

Common Terms #

So we’re all on the same page, terms and abbreviations that will be used frequently are:

• Global Cooldown (GCD): The speed at which you can execute skills within the game itself, meaning how fast the game will allow you to execute commands to use an ability.
• Abilities Per Minute (APM): The numerical total of abilities executed in one minute in a given combat encounter. Typically, lower GCD increases this number. Assuming a player knows their discipline and rotation well enough, a higher GCD number can indicate comfort, skill and uptime. Excepted APM varies by role and discipline, in addition to the activity (parsing typically has higher APM results than an operations fight, for example).
• Breakpoint: A tenth of a second reduction (due to SWTOR’s tendency to round) in GCD, which otherwise falls at 1.5 seconds by default (reductions being 1.4, 1.3, 1.2 and so on).
• Skill/Ability: Used interchangeably to reference the actions your character can take in combat.

Alacrity effects and is affected by… #

Global Cooldown (GCD) Breakpoints #

SWTOR has relatively set breakpoints for Global Cooldowns from update to update, while the stat points needed to reach a given GCD breakpoint varies between major updates. Breakpoints are often considered in tenths of a second and percentages.

• 1.5s: 0% (no points in alacrity – this is the baseline GCD for all players)
• 1.4s: 7.14% alacrity
• 1.3s: 15.38% alacrity
• 1.2s: 25% alacrity

Cast/Channel Time and Tick Rate #

Alacrity affects cast (a skill that has a required execution period before the effect is applied) and channel (a skill that applies effects over the duration of its use) time. Higher alacrity and a lower GCD allows casts to be completed more quickly, channeled abilities finish faster.

In addition, high alacrity also affects the “tick rate” of things like DoT abilities, meaning the damage is applied quicker and the DoT/debuff is expended faster. This is often desirable as DoTs can be very powerful and the quicker they deal their damage, the more damage done in a short period of time. Conversely, DoTs expiring too quickly can affect overall rotation and follow-up damage (specifically for any abilities that are dependent upon them being present on an enemy to deal higher damage, such as Virulence Sniper or Lethality Operative). Find the sweet spot for your discipline to make the most of these effects.

Energy/Resource Management #

Outside of the effects of GCD is the way alacrity affects resource management. Higher alacrity often means that you regenerate or restore your energy reserves quicker. Aside from disciplines that work off alternative energy systems, such as Guardian/Juggernaut and Sentinel/Marauder, all other combat styles have alacrity-affected resource systems.

If you struggle with energy management, we recommend first ensuring that you are using the correct rotation or skill priority for your discipline, and then possibly increasing the amount of alacrity you have in small increments. Note that this is more feasible for healers than it is for DPS, given healers have a larger distribution of stat points they can put toward alacrity (versus also having to invest in accuracy).

Skill Cooldowns #

Most, though not all, abilities are affected by alacrity through cooldown reduction. A lower cooldown on a skill allows you to use it more frequently. Cooldown is different from cast time or channel time reduction as it refers to the period in which you are literally locked out of using a skill. Since many powerful abilities typically have longer cooldowns to reduce the chance of them being used irresponsibly and “breaking” the game or an encounter, a higher alacrity rating can offset that.

Skills that don’t tend to be affected by cooldown reduction and alacrity often include defensives, such as Force Barrier and Saber Ward.

Ping and Latency #

A consideration that often goes unseen is the ramifications of ping/server latency, computer speed, and internet speed.

• Ping/Latency: Your distance and the quality of your connection to the SWTOR servers will affect the consistency of your GCD and the rate at which you can execute your abilities. While you may have numerically met the alacrity breakpoint requirement, you may not consistently experience that breakpoint if your server connection is poor or if you experience high latency. The typical fix to this is to run slightly over the breakpoint by anywhere from 100 to 400 points in order to even out any inconsistencies. Starparse and Parsely have excellent GCD tools where you can evaluate at which breakpoint the majority of your skills are activated at.
• Computer Speed: SWTOR is largely CPU-run and, as an older game on an older game engine, computers without newer CPUs or even a cheap graphics card, may struggle to run the game steadily. Lag, freezing and slow load times may be more often experienced in newer content and in situations where you are surrounded by other players. This issue is largely on the player-side and fiddling with your stats won’t have much of an impact. Instead, try reducing the strain on your computer by closing non-essential applications and services running in the background, and lowering the resolution or graphic quality of SWTOR. This will free up CPU and RAM space that can be dedicated to SWTOR.
• Internet Speed: Closely related to ping and latency, the steadiness and quality of your internet connection plays a large part in how often you can execute skills. If you are traveling, have slow internet speeds, are experiencing bad weather, and so on, you may run into many of the symptoms associated with high ping/latency and computer speed (lag, freezing, inconsistent GCD). Minor adjustment to stats can help, but otherwise, reducing the number of applications and devices taking up bandwidth (such as streaming videos or music, voice chat or game downloads) in your location will be more effective. Else, try to avoid running large-group content if you are having internet speed issues.