Decided to help with gear selection for all the ops out there... I'll start by listing the stats with full custom blade set and compare it to regular blade set, green shipyard set, and custom chroma set. All stats are using the same custom blade fin dual pistols and epic condor eye damage implant.

Custom BladeTech - Includes 2 crit 5 dmg bonus
Str 1
Dex 201
Int 3
Hit 108
Crit 17
Dodge 3
Health 448
Regen 2
Mana 363
Regen 2
Dmg 69-100
DPS 169
Armor 381

Regular BladeTech - No set bonus
Hit -5
Crit -2
Health -50
Mana -25
Dmg -5
DPS -10

Green Shipyard Set - No set bonus
Dex +35
Int +35
Hit -14
Crit -11
Dodge +1
Health -6
Mana +49
Dmg -1
DPS -1
Armor -52

Custom Chroma Set - 2 crit 5 dmg bonus
Hit -6
Health -25
Armor -54

Summary

The Custom BladeTech set is the best, but barely! Compared to the level 30 custom set, your 100k recipe cost plus items and crafting mats only gets you 6 hit, 25 health, and 54 armor.

Custom ChromaWeave set comes in second with identical damage, 25 less health, 54 less armor, and 6 less hit. You essentially get a 16.5% armor boost, a 5.9% health boost, and a 5.9% hit boost. Your hit is over 100 either way.

Plain old Green Shipyard set comes in third. Compared to the number two option you lose 8 hit, 11 crit, 1 dmg, and 1DPS. You gain 35 dex, 35 int, 1 dodge, 19 health, 49 mana, and 2 armor.

Last and definitely least is the regular level 35 "epic" BladeTech set. Compared to the cheap green items in third place, you lose 35 dex, 35 int, 1 dodge, 44 health, 74 mana, 4 dmg, and 9 DPS. You gain 9 hit, 9 crit, and 52 armor.

This means that the new higher level cap "epic" set is actually a downgrade from the cheaper custom set five levels lower. It's also a downgrade to the green set you get from trash mobs. You end up with 11.1% more health, 21.9% more mana, and 5.7% more dps by using trash gear.

I just don't understand why STS would do this. The way dex and int are scaling with common items are making them more powerful than the expensive "epic" items you need to farm bosses for.

Please comment if you want STS to actually look at these numbers and fix this issue. At the current scaling pace, common items will be the best gear, even over custom, with the next cap raise!