I used Watchman and I use this build. Also note, I'm PVE only. http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#501bIbRrRMfsZhRMZM.2 Compared to your build, I take Watchguard instead of Force Fade. In PVE, the ability to have faster interrupts is way better than the useless Force Camo effect. Pretty much the only reason you should be using it as an emergency threat dump to your companion in dire situations. Minus two seconds of Force Kick is way better. I also take Valor instead of Recompense. That's a personal think. I took Riposte off my bar. I didn't like the situational activation and its 3 Focus cost screws up my focus management. Getting the extra Centering for more Zen usage, I feel, is way better than having Rebuke CD reduction. After the 31 in Watchman, the rest are up to your tastes. I like the AOE defense and the CD redux on Master Strike, because I like to mix in a lot when I'm fighting. I feel like three points in Insight for more Force crits are wasted, since Watchman doesn't really utilize Force (which are Force Sweep and Force Stasis - and maybe either Cauterize or Overload Saber, I can't remember). But I feel since I get auto-crits from Zen, which I'm using all the time anyway so that seems like 3 points wasted.

Definitely Doc. Doc can pull you through just about any fight as long as you're not severely overmatched. And as long as you keep threat off of him, most Heroic 2+s are solo-able if you're at or above level. I preferred Kira over T7 until that point for story reasons, and I also felt her DPS plus my DPS was better than T7s average tanking ability.

The biggest problem with Sentinel tanking is you have no mechanism to grab threat if someone else gets it off you. While your massive damage should be enough if you don't really have anyone else capable of outpacing you. But Sentinel does have good defensive skills and with some dedicated healing it can work. Just not ideal.

I'm getting to the level where I need to be concerned about this. I'm a Marksmanship sniper and intend to stay in this tree as I level throughout. I read in a guide a long time back the MM snipers should probably avoid taking Snap Shot (insta-Snipe when entering cover) and/or Reactive Shot (reduces Ambush CD on Snipe crits), Rapid Fire (reduces CDs on Ambush and Series of Shots) and Alacrity in general. The main reasoning was that having these skills cooldown and/or activate faster was that it would screw with the Sniper's ability to adequately manage his energy without having to add additional regular shots in the mix to keep your energy level high and regen-ing quickly in sustained fights. That was probably eight months ago, though, and wanted to get an updated opinion from people. What if any of those MM skills should be avoided and why? Or was that some bad advice? It sounded logical to me at the time before I even started playing my Sniper significantly.

Actually it would be nice if you could send them out and say, "I want 20 Corusca gems!" and then every hour Kira comes back and says "I got (X number) and I need more money." then just click that and auto send her out again. I hate running materials missions that may give you two different metals at the same level and you have to run it and run it and run it to get what you want. Kind of unrelated but made me think of it.

Obviously crafting for a specific pre-fixed item is way more difficult than the linear path for mods and such. I think one aspect you're overlooking, however, is that these percentages are very low to try to brute-force through. The truth is there IS a lot of luck involved, because it's a RNG system, that, yes, has been talked about to death but still not changed. I don't have the game in front of my right now, but if I'm not mistaken, the chance to RE a schematic off a blue-grade item is 10 percent? Or is it only 5 percent when you get to those higher levels? Anyhow, from there, if you're specifically targeting one prefix combo out of five, you're setting yourself up for a lot of frustration. That means on top of a 1 in 10 chance or 1 in 20 chance to not RE anything, you're adding another 1 in 5 chance to get the one you want. As far as I'm aware, just because you already RE'd one of those last five schematics doesn't take it out of the pool. It's not like, "Oh you already have Expert, here's Vehemence instead!" It's more like, "You got Expert! Oh you already have Expert? OK then you get nothing." You mention the odds and yes, it is extremely rare to have a streak of so many failures in a row. But it's not impossible. The probability of REing at all is either 1 in 10 or 1 in 20 (again, can't remember) and then the conditional probability to RE the prefix you want is 1 in 5. So your overall probability of crafting that one specific prefix combo on any try is either 1 in 50 or 1 in 100. Again, those tries are all independent of one another. You don't gain anything by rolling multiple times. You odds will be 1 in 100 on try No. 1 and they will be the same on try No. 100. Your percentage chance to win isn't increasing with each try. You're not "due" to win eventually. That's the gambler's fallacy. So while the chance of failing 30 times in a row is whatever small percentage, the chance of you failing on each try is 99 percent, period. Crafting a specific artifact-grade prefixed item is horribly punishing. The numbers back that up. It's not a great crafting system and you're no the first person to experience this frustration (I had it trying to craft a purple-grade enhancement on my Sentinel and that's not even the prefixed kind of RE). But that's the way it goes. Math sucks sometimes.

Through Artifice you can craft red, blue, green and yellow at any level. RGB come from Archaeology while yellow comes from Treasure Hunting. Orange is a color Artifice can begin crafting at high level (like 40+) because those materials begin dropping as Treasure Hunting rewards too. You can find low-level orange crystals in some drop or reward sabers on Republic side. Original subscribers can also get yellow-black crystals from a vendor on the fleet (basic ones for cheap, more powerful ones at higher cost). There are also some crystals available in the Cartel Market (orange something, orange-black maybe?) As for other specialty crystals, I believe you're mostly out of luck until higher levels. There is a schematic people can get to craft a Magenta crystal that is Lvl 30ish, otherwise many of the other are high-level rewards that come from PvP or special events. I was able to get a green-black from the Rakghoul event that went on in February or whenever that was, but that's a Lvl 50 crystal too.

I am a habitual crafter and as such I am almost always broke early on. The main problem is as you're trying to level your skills to a point where you'll be able to craft appropriate items for your level, you'll find that you've quickly drained your cash reserves. If you're trying to run missions and craft while leveling, you'll probably find by the point you hit the the end of Dromund Kaas or early Balmora that you're now out of creds. The main problem is the egregious price and low returns on the mission skills you need for upgraded craftables (like Treasure Hunting or Underworld Trading). And even the basic ones (like Scavenging) eat up a lot of cash. The most important mods to consider with agents are barrels, which will keep up the base damage of your rifles (and also your combat knife although that doesn't really make sense) and armoring, which controls the base armor level in armors. For Sniper, I would suggest Cybertech, Scavenging, Underworld Trading for the following reasons: You'll be able to craft armoring, mods and earpieces (and to a lesser extent grenades). This will give you the ability to fill two spots on your armors and one spot on your weapon as well as cover earpieces, which rarely drop from enemies or as quest rewards. Armstech, while allowing you to craft barrels, isn't really that useful because the only other thing you craft out of it is guns, which you'll probably never use because an orange-grade item with modifications is almost always superior. Artifice would give you crystals and enhancements, but lightsabers hilts have no use to you. Armormech has no mod piece crafting and only has armors, which, like armstech, are generally useless because an orange-grade with mods is almost always better. Synthweaving is totally useless because it's like armormech except for Force users. Biochem is still generally useful for anyone in both PvE and especially PvP respects, but I've just never rolled with it since I prefer to have at least some type of mod piece I can craft. While crafting early, I would suggest only focusing on crafting green-grade stuff since trying to RE and then craft blue and purple grade is a money sink and generally not that beneficial early, because you level so fast. As you get higher - maybe 30+, you can then try to start focusing on crafting some of those higher order pieces because you'll be better able to afford it.

Hmmmm, I'm vaguely remembering this set, which I think I have in my ship storage (not complete). If I'm remembering correctly, tackling the Voss or Belsavis bonus series may also yield a few pieces. Can't exactly remember.

The biggest problem with Sentinel is that there is a huge gap between getting Kira and then getting Doc. Doc is, with a pretty much consensus vote, the best companion for Sentinels. I used Kira while leveling for these reasons: 1) T7 is a droid and therefore uses droid parts (which as far as I can tell NEVER drop from mobs) as well as blasters. Therefore he is either using crappy quest reward items (which generally lag behind statwise compared to the content you tackle) or I have to invest a lot to keep his gear up. 2) T7's tanking ability is very low if he doesn't have good gear. Also as you start to hit some of the harder planets like Alderaan and Tatooine, he doesn't hold up very well in a fight. 3) Kira uses people clothes and sabers. Since I was artifice, I was able to provide her with blue-grade hilts, crystals and enhancements in her armor (bought her the all-orange ceremonial garb on Coruscant) and only had to worry about keeping up her armoring and mods to a lesser extent from commendations or GTN. Also occassionally you'll get a good drop from mobs that will help improve her overall stats too. 4) Kira is damage and I am damage. Since the Sentinel doesn't have an extremely wide array of defensive options til later levels, I found it was easier to just try to blow through mobs as fast as I could, and Kira helps more with that than having T7 standing there getting pummeled. Most times Kira was able to finish off one or two weak grade enemies while I was working on someone stronger. 5) I preferred having Kira around for story purposes, so I wanted to make sure she was getting all the approval and not T7. Also I preferred being able to manage her weapon and clothing apperances as opposed to T7 who has a static model that doesn't change with gear, even though that has no direct effect on the gameplay.

Just because you wield two sabers and pour out a lot of damage doesn't mean you have to give into rage/anger/fury to fight. It just means that you use two sabers instead of one and are attack-focused. In the Watchman spec you utilize Juyo form, which is also known as the Ferocity form. According to Wookiepedia: "A Form VII practitioner was said to maintain a calm exterior appearance, but they were also stated to experience significant internal pressure, while using the Ferocity Form." Ataru form (for Combat spec) is also probably the most offensively-focused of the lightsaber forms as well. While taking an aggressive combat approach will likely put more strain on a Sentinel to maintain his balance with the Light Side, it's not impossible. Although he's not in the same vein as a Sentinel or an aggressive fighter, look at how much combat Obi-Wan was able to go through during the wars and still maintain his balance. I support the person before me who stated that the essence is even built into the mechanics of the class: Focus, Centering, Zen, Transcendence. That's the challenge, being able to maintain control while still being a killing machine. You know, sometimes the best defense is a good offense and all that stuff.

None of the specs really shine at such low levels. Combat actually takes a while longer to really start hitting well for Sentinels (kind of like Engineering and Lethality are better at 30+ for Snipers). Until you can get up higher in the tree, Combat is kind of lackluster, but piles out good damage later. You may take a little time to get warmed up in Combat, but as you get Ataru and a couple skills that support its use, you'll start clicking fine.

Yup tell me about it. I'm working my way through Nar Shadaa now and it's Breach then smack them around with Double Strike until I proc a PA then Project. Not very scintillating going from Sentinel to Shadow, but I'm looking forward to later levels when I actually have some more skills to manage in tougher fights.

I have to agree. The insta-damage is what I wanted before I got it, but now I miss the smooth animation of lifting it up and throwing it. If we're going to do insta-damage like that, the skill might as well be changed to like Force Wave or or Turbulence, where you're just projecting a wall of Force to hit them.

Both of those last two are correct. They're not orange grade like you would expect, but you can find moddable green techblades for Qyzen. There's one available through the commendation vendor on Coruscant and as you can find them later from weapon vendors. They're out there and they're upgradeable so you should never need a new one once you get one.

Well, I think we've gotten to the bottom of the problem now! From your second post I see a variety of problems already. 1) You should invest in and use most if not all of your skills. They all have uses. Pretty much with my Sentinel the only skills I don't regularly use are Blade Storm (because I'm Watchman), Transcendence (again because Zen is superior for Watchman), Leg Sweep (since slowing enemies is really of no use in PvE) and Riposte (because it messes up my Focus management). Other than that, I use nearly every skill available —*not all the time, but they are needed. As I said before, Opportune Strike and Pommel Strike are free skills (no focus cost) that can up your DPs by helping you eliminate weak enemies quickly. Awe is an AOE stun that is useful when fighting multiple enemies. Force Camouflage can dump your threat. Pretty much every skill is useful in some way or in a particular situation. Train them and test them out. If you have questions about a particular skill or why it is useful, feel free to ask and I'll help you out. 2) As was said early, Sentinel is one class that really doesn't benefit from a hybrid build. Pick one of the three trees and go with it. You'll want a 31/x/x build of some type. I personally like Watchman, but Combat and Focus are both good too. The form you use will be determined by which tree you spec in — Watchman used Juyo, Combat uses Ataru and Focus uses Shii-Cho. Watchman utilizes damage-over-time skills and has self-healing, which Combat and Focus offer more burst damage possibilities. Personally I like the measured rhythm of Watchman, but I'd suggest experimenting. 3) Also as was said, the best way to keep fire off of your healer companion is to use Force Sweep. It has a wide range and does good damage which should draw the aggro of every enemy near you. Also, since you leap in, you'll get additional proximity threat compared to Doc, who should be 30 meters away. If you rip through the first enemy with a combo of Leap/Opportune Strike (which usually is enough on a regular grade baddie), you can occupy a second leaving only one or two even capable of breaking away to Doc. Kira is good for the midgame, but late she really doesn't have the beefiness to hold up in prolonged combat. Doc will allow you to stay in there nearly indefinitely. Even trying to solo a Champion grade, he should give you enough healing to survive for several minutes. I'll leave it at that for now. It's nothing to be embarrassed about if this is really your first MMO. It is for me too, although I had dabbled in others and played a lot of CRPGs in my day. They are complex and can be confusing. My suggestion is to keep asking questions and look for some guides. There used to be a guide stickied to the top of the forum but I guess that's gone now. Reading a guide really helped me to learn how to play the class at a high level by explaining how skills work, why they're useful and what kind of stats to focus on. But since we don't have one, feel free to ask whatever questions you need and I'll give you a hand. EDIT: Also what server are you on? If you happen to be on Ebon Hawk we can possibly meet up in game and I'll give you some pointers.

Helpful insight. Anyhow, playing only the PvE side of things, I haven't really noticed a significant decrease in my performance so it hasn't been too bad. Then again I've been playing a lot more of my Shadow and Sniper too recently so maybe I'm not paying that close of attention.

Hold on, before we start talking about operations and hard mode flashpoints, I think we need to focus on general gameplay. If you're having a hard time mopping up standard mobs, there are more serious problems than thinking about tackling end-game content. Here's some general tips to help you play the Sentinel class at a high level: 1) Utilize Pommel Strike and Opportune Strike. Both of these skills cost no focus, but have specific uses. Opportune Strike only works against opponents that are slowed and snared, so use it on regulars/lieutenant grade enemies right after using Force Leap, since it snares. Use Opportune Strike to quickly dispatch regular enemies after hitting them with a Force Sweep (since they're stunned). Those two skills can help you quickly get low-grade enemies off you who don't have a lot of life but do a fair amount of damage. 2) Interrupt! If you are not interrupting skills you will die a lot. I have Force Kick on my tilde key right next to 1 so I can always easily reach it. Remember that Force Leap and Force Stasis can also interrupt. Even against weaker enemies, interrupting something like Full Auto can seriously help your survivability. 3) Roll with Doc. Doc is easily your best companion because of his heals. Turn off his Carbonite skill since it wastes time that he could be healing you and make sure he's got his healing stance activated. Keep his gear up as best you can (focusing on Cunning) so that his heals will be bigger. As long as you're not biting off more than you can chew, he should rarely draw aggro so you'll be getting nothing but heals without having to worry about him. With a good-geared Doc, you should have no problem with anything less than an Elite or Champ level. 4) Utilize your defensive skills. You have several - Rebuke, Saber Ward, Awe, Guarded by the Force and Force Camoflague (and maybe Unity too if you have it unlocked through Legacy). I like to start fights with Rebuke since it cools down quickly. Pop Saber Ward if your life is dropping quickly. Guarded by the Force heals you over time. Awe is your only AOE stun that can buy you a few seconds. And Force Camoflague will drop your aggro, effectively translating it to your companion. When you use all of these in the right way, Sentinels are very hard to kill because of your high damage. Also, use Stun Droid to stun droids. It will knock them out of the fight for 60 seconds. 5) Focus on your hilts and armoring. Hilts control the base damage of your sabers while armoring sets the base armor value. By level 50 you should pretty much be wearing all orange-grade. Mods can be expensive to craft or buy, but you want to make sure that those two are at the highest level first, since they're affecting base stats and not just secondary stats. 6) Although some people might argue now after a recent nerf, I still think Watchman provides the overall best damage and survivability. The spec offers good sustained damage and the ability to self-heal, which can be critical over a long fight against a strong opponent. Make sure to utilize Zen when you have your burns available to get a quick healing jolt. Also remember that Valorous Call will instantly give you 30 Centering for a free Zen if you need another jolt of healing. 7) Use Dispatch when available. If you're specced properly, it costs 3 Focus and does more damage than Slash. You can only use it on enemies with less than 30 percent health, but it's high damage for a low focus cost. 8) Focus weaker enemies first. This may seem the wrong way to go about it, but as I pointed out before, although they have lower hitpoints, they hit just about as hard at most lieutenant enemies. So you want to kill them quicker to get that damage off you. In team fights, tanks have the priority of focusing the strongest enemies, while DPS like Sents should rip through the weak enemies. 9) Make sure to keep up your Force Might buff. Also adding a stim can help your performance. Try to grab the buffs from other classes too if you can. I like to "drive-by buff" people in the field and they usually return the favor. 10) Don't try to tackle Heroic 2+s without help. You may think you're strong enough to handle a 2+ on your own, but late in the game they become too much to handle alone unless you have great gear. So grab a friend if you're going to try to take those. I remember trying to do so on Hoth by myself and continually getting put in my place. Having great gear can help you out, but playing Sentinel at a high level takes more skill and focus than other classes who can sit back and spam a few skills. You have to actively manage 10+ skills at the same time to be an effective Sent. It's not for the weak of heart. But once you get a good rhythm and feel for playing it efficiently, you'll find that there are few enemies that can stand in front of you. Once you can get some higher PVE gear from Daily Commendations or Black Hole on Corellia you'll be better set to tackle further stuff too.

Yeah, once you pick up your healing companion, you'll soon discover that the game is a breeze. Also make sure to keep up the gear on whatever companion you use. I suggest using Kira over T7, since T7 doesn't really tank that well as you get to some of those later planets. Kira does good damage and it's easier to get some gear for her. You can buy green-grade stuff for her for a couple hundred credits on GTN usually.

That's nothing new. Most Sentinels report that there is a significant increase in difficulty when you hit Tatooine and Alderaan. Truth is it does ramp up - enemies hit a lot harder and if you're not playing the class at a high efficiency you may notice yourself struggling. The basic is you should get the best gear that you can currently equip. A higher level green-grade may be better than a lower level blue-grade. So just check the stats on it before you equip it. Typically orange-grade with mods in it is the best way to go, but you'll find that it's often more expensive. Either you have to craft pieces, buy them on GTN or buy them with commendations (and you'll find the commendation ones are within the level range of the planet). Remember that with your orange-grade gear, the most important pieces to have upgraded are lightsaber hilts and armoring. Hilts determine the base damage of your sabers while armoring sets the armor level. The other pieces add secondary stats but do not control the base numbers. Since I was artifice I was always able to make sure my hilts were the best I could use at the time and had to hit the GTN for armorings.

I just resubscribed this month and have been hearing about this Watchman nerf, but haven't really seen much of a difference in actual practice. I ran through my Black Hole dailies about as efficiently as ever. I attribute the slight reduction in performance more to me having five months off of the game than I do the effects of the nerf. Personally I still think Watchman provides the best damage and survivability of any of the Sentinel trees. But Combat and Focus aren't bad. I've always played Watchman so it's natural to me and I don't want to make a switch to a new system. But if you don't have that ingrained in you yet, I'd say give it a shot and if it doesn't work out you can switch back. Being overleveled and having Doc really should remove most of the danger anyway, so feel free to experiment.

I definitely support a Cartel Coin based recustomization option, both for appearance and for names. I'm kicking myself repeatedly for not taking the time to think through what I wanted to rename my Jedi Shadow when I was forced to after server consolidation, and now every time I log in with her I just get mad at myself. Tying it to Cartel Coins makes it an option that people will have to pay extra for and it can help keep players happy, both F2P and subs. Because I really need to fix that Shadow's name!

Well it's been about forever since I've been that level. I'd say if you're wearing all blue or purple gear or orange gear with appropriately leveled armoring, you should be fine. Since Sentinels wear medium armor and they're extremely offensively focused, you're not going to have great defense. Just remember, if you're wearing orange armors, the armor level is determined by the level of the armoring modification you have in there. So make sure to either craft, GTN or buy with commendations the best armoring you can find for your level. But for Sentinel, your best defense is a good offense, at least until you get your healer companion later.

Yeah, pretty much you shouldn't be using Juyo unless you're going to go Watchman tree. In Watchman you have a combo of Overload Saber and Cauterize as burns, to get the most bonus out of it. If you don't want to focus on DoT skills, I'd suggest going with Combat or Focus trees and their respective forms.

Here's the best piece of advice I can give you for help with leveling - get a couple levels up on the content. Do some space missions, run a couple flashpoints and finishing quest bonuses to keep yourself three or so levels above the missions you're tackling. Until you get Doc, things can be a little dicey. But after you get him, you're on easy street.