I've had plenty of 0/0 Voidstar ties because of the ridiculous number of Imperial healers I play against.... side that defends 2nd wins them all, which has always been the Imperials in my case I would prefer a tie over what is essentially random (who attacks first).

Your only hope is to time your defensive CD's right if they are as good as you are... I've dueled a gunslinger in my guild that is damn good (he won a 1v1 tourney on my server), and I can beat him if I use all of my defensive CD's, but if anything is on CD I can only get him to ~10% health. Snipers are effectively your counter, but don't worry, they're not very popular and they're your only counter

A Sentinel with half of a brain can completely neuter a Mercenary. I generally come away from fights with Mercs at about 90% health. They're the easiest class in the game to shut down... period. The only way you are useful is if people ignore you.

I'm only champion geared and as a Watchman I will hit 450k-500k in full-length Voidstars. I always cheese and cap west quickly on Alderaan and then defend it so never much damage there, Huttball is hit or miss depending on the # of Sorcs that want to chain-knockback me I don't think having a "pocket healer" is necessary to doing insane damage as a Sentinel due to defensive abilities, but having at least one healer on your team sure helps. I often have 0 healers on my team in wz's and do better than most as I can escape to health power-ups much easier. I don't think 5k is feasible at this point unless you are full-battlemaster fighting 0-expertise 50 and get really lucky, but I can get to 4.5k with power adrenal/power relic/inspiration + merc slash crit

So you want a 2nd invulnerability bubble? To go with our 4 second stealth invulnerability? Sounds balanced.

We did Karagga with 2 Sentinels and no one having more than 3/5 PvE set. We are easy-mode for our healers because we can survive all kinds of crazy happenings in addition to never having to worry about running out of resources for our DPS.

I'm curious about something. To the people that think this class is weak in a group setting: Do you have problems with DPS Mercenaries? How do you feel you do against enemy healers? How do you fare against Sorcerors?

I love the complexity of this class and would be sorely disappointed if the "general public" gets its way. This isn't even about damage numbers in a warzone. There is exactly 1 class in this game that gives a [Watchman] Sentinel problems (Sniper), and in every other case the Sentinel has the advantage (Assassin, Powertech, Juggernaut, Operative), or a huge advantage (Mercenary and Sorceror). By the way, those two classes are the most played and most complained about classes the Empire has right now... so... playing a Sentinel just feels like easy-mode right now. That's not even getting into how perfectly suited Sentinels are to shutting down healers. Maybe if the Combat tree turned into a truly different playstyle that was easier and worked well in PvP it would be OK, but if general Sentinel abilities were made easier... oh geez, nerfs would come down hard about two months later. I'm confident that, given time, more people will have success with this class. Even "average" players. Do they have the patience to stick with it? I don't know. Fundamentally changing this class will kill its appeal.

As a Watchman Sentinel the ONLY class/spec that I have problems with is my mirror, the Annihilation Marauder. I have never ever ever lost 1v1 against any other spec/class, even when they have the gear advantage. We are just impossible to kill 1v1 if skill and gear are equal. Annihilation Marauders are the only class my healer friends complain about. In WZ's I stick to enemy healers like glue, even if they are really good Sorc's. Operative healers are completely helpless, and Merc healers must turtle to survive as the OP stated. I generally am able to stay up indefinitely with intermittent heals vs. a healer being healed by a healer being guarded by a tank while a DPS is on me. It is all kinds of fun.

Bring a Sentinel or Marauder. Done.

This guy gets it. He just forgot to mention the horribly overpowered +80% Transcendence in Watchman that you simply must enjoy before they nerf it.

Hey Araxus, you were in one of the videos Dox posted from Ilum from Thursday, and you looked pretty darn useful jumping on people, drawing fire, going invulnerable and lol'ing as they stood in our AoE's trying feebly to kill you. My basic Ilum rotation is Jump -> smack, smack, smack -> get focused -> pop GbtF as I get low -> stealth and transcend out back to my group to get healed... rinse and repeat. It works wonders as a disruption to the enemy formation and you can frustrate the healers while you're there, drop an awe if you can jump to their rear lines, generally you will cause a little bit of panic if someone else jumps in with you or unstealths as you jump in. It's good fun.

More survivability. That's kind of a good thing in PvP. Force Fade + Focused Pursuit are so awesome; when you chain GbtF + Force Camo + Transcendance, you are invulnerable for 9 seconds while moving at 180% movement speed... lol. I don't think my guild would let me spec out of Focused Pursuit now that they've gotten used to it

I think it's a different way of saying QQ MOAR. That's my best guess.

DPS is not dependent on a resource like Force or Energy that can run out.

Little blue shaded bars on blue ability icons = Interface disaster. Hopefully this is fixed ASAP.

No way, they are simply fools. Challenge them to a duel, kick their asses, and bid them good day. You have NO DOWN TIME ON YOUR DPS.... which happens to be the same as the other DPS classes. That has a little bit of value in a boss fight, eh? Ever heard a Consular/Trooper/Smuggler complain about being out of resources? Doesn't happen to you. Fools.

I try to get focused... then lol as I pop defensive CD's and get healed back to full health 8 seconds later. Bwahahahaha. Smart players know that our weakness is CC, not focusing us... you focus a Scoundrel or a Sage, not a Sentinel (a competent one, at least) even though we have the same damage potential, because they are way easier to kill.

Jung Ma circle jerks are my favorite kind. Server forums please? What are your feelings on the actual topic, mr. marauder?

That's too bad, I know your team always put up a good fight in WZ's and on Ilum. Will you be playing mostly mornings or evenings now? Order of Shadows has some of the few Sorc healers that know how to stay alive. To the point about needing a non-channeled stun... why? Sentinels are designed to beat up on casters. Great interrupts, great mobility, no cast-time on abilities... we're the kind of class other classes NEED a stun for... how else can we be shut down? Meanwhile it's laughably easy for a Sentinel to shut down a Mercenary, Heals Operative, or a Sorcerer because our interrupts combine to be much better than a non-channeled stun against such classes. So who do you need a stun against? An Operative or Assassin? Maybe, but we're hardly their first target and so meetings between our classes are generally uncommon (or should be). Even then, our easy-to-apply DoT's make it a pain for them to stealth away, our hard-mitigation defensive abilities frustrate their burst-focus, and their defensive abilities are more geared towards defending against non-physical damage. So what would this stun accomplish? I suppose the big advantage would be against Juggernauts/Powertechs, but is that necessary from a design standpoint if the game is being balanced around teamplay?

I believe that you solo queued a lot early on; it's the only way to get to 60 valor so quickly. I don't get to play 12 hours a day, but when I do I like to play with guildmates, so I can have memorable matches like the Alderaan yesterday morning. I don't think Xavory was there but I know I was stuck to Anethia the whole time. You probably don't lose many Alderaans from what I've seen of my faction in huttball so I'm sure you recall bmore, slix, and me going 1-2-3 in damage (all just above 300k) in the W, validating Sentinels as a solid member of any team make-up. I'm not recounting this as "lol I won" but to assuage the concerns of those that feel Sentinels are underpowered. This isn't beating on lvl 12's, it's a fair fight between geared 50's. Transcendence is the best-kept secret in the "lol op skill" department. Your whole team moving at +80% speed in combat (when talented) for 10 seconds? Yes please. Not having a Sentinel or Marauder in your group is gimping yourself.

Yes. Yes we are. I'll let you believe what you must, but Kaymu/Slix literally cheer in TS when they top me in DPS. Fred plays during the day because he only plays at work so I don't get a chance to group with him. I remembered the WZ because it was yesterday morning before I went to work, I only did maybe 5, and I don't usually play in the morning because I stay up so damn late. Totally sad for no server forums. PvE may be a different story, I've done limited content and without DPS meters it's kind of difficult to really see how we stack up. Solo PvE is a legitimate concern, though. I don't know how you fix that without breaking everything else, though.

Oh, I know, no disrespect intended, but we do joke about it... good times fighting you But to Araxus, I think Focus is a legitimate spec, but not superior when it comes to PvP. It is worse off in 1v1's, not as effective in countering healers, and a little gimmicky, but it does have higher damage potential because you actually use AoE's as opposed to just single-target damage. I think Watchman is better at sticking to targets as well because you're never short on centering for Transcendence if needed and Leap is on a 12 sec CD. With more focus to work with leg slashes are easy to come by as well. So I guess all this is saying that maybe a "buff" could be in order for Sentinels, but just to Combat and a little for Focus. Not to general damage done and such.

None of these abilities respect the GCD currently. I use them while I am mid-leap quite often. This is more of a preference, and you can replace the Mod/Enhancement slots in PvP gear currently, so I would encourage you to do so with mods/enhancements that are more in line with what you want. No power/accuracy is built-in to the armor, it's just in the replaceable slots. You can get these from crafters or high-end PvE content, including taking them out of purple PvE drops.

Ah! If only I had a pocket healer like Tidus. Anethia is his btw. I have healers that usually WZ with me but they aren't leashed to me like Tidus's healers are to him. Certainly no battlemaster healers. He doesn't melt my face, he tickles. He melts Sages, but that's what Assassins are built for. I can't really kill him with his pocket healer 1v2, but the few times I've gotten him alone it has been a very close fight. When he was still DPS spec'ed I ripped him apart in a Huttball where we got a fair 1v1, but as tank spec I have no interest in killing him so I just ignore him and attack who he's guarding. He can't kill me and I can't kill him is how it usually goes when we meet. I just got a nice premade vs. premade with him this morning with his Battlemaster Sorc group and we won a very lively Alderaan 150-0 or so. But he can't reach Sentinel/Marauder DPS levels. If he rolled with a Marauder like Akashe, for example, it would become quite clear that Assassins don't measure up to Marauders in pure DPS. They have other tools that make them great to have on a team, but pure DPS is not it. But enough with the Jung Ma gossip, I do solo queue warzones, or queue with no healer, and my experience is much the same. I have so much survivability it hurts me much less than it hurts a Scoundrel or Gunslinger or Shadow, for sure. I was using that as an example of how Sentinel stacks up against other classes when played by equally skilled players. You're not a bad player if you're the same Araxus from Jung Ma, so don't give into this "make Sentinels the same as the other classes" BS. Learn to use the toolset you have to the fullest extent and embrace the niche we occupy... or roll a class that better suits what you expect.