Spike is definitely close to useless for non Darkness builds. Spike either needs to be buffed, or they need to give us a completely new opener that isn't terrible. It could be similar to garrote for all I care (15s dot that silences for a few seconds). We are a stealth class with 0 viable stealth openers in PvP. Why the hell is my best tactic right now to stealth up to someone and then Voltaic Slash or Force Slow? Really?

I'm not quite sure why so many players are claiming that there is no ability delay. The difference in character and ability responsiveness is absolutely mind boggling when going from WoW to SWToR. It has been acknowledged by Bioware that there is indeed an issue. What is there to debate here?

Let's be real here. Nearly every Assassin I talk to does not use Spike in PvP. It's an utter waste of resolve. We only have a .5 second window to use a GCD during that knockdown, it's useless. Spike needs a significant buff, whether it be damage or a longer knockdown. I think it's pretty much unanimous that as a SQUISHY stealth class, we would much rather our opponent have a full resolve bar and 5-6k less HP over a person with a half resolve bar and 700 less HP.

Completely agree with the OP. We can stealth but our class has absolutely no synergy with it. We are the squishiest class in the game when using any charge besides Dark Charge. Our burst out of stealth is essentially non-existent. Our backstab, Maul, is utterly useless without a duplicity proc. And even then, it's underwhelming. Our abilities have far too much ramp up time: 2x Voltaic Slash for your Shock to hit hard. 5 Surging Charge stacks to make your discharge hit hard. Duplicity proc to make Maul worth using. It makes very little sense to design a squishy, stealth class around abilities that you have stick on a target for awhile to finally pump out some decent damage. Assassin's Spike does crits for 700 damage and knocks down for 2 seconds. Operative's Hidden Strike crits for 5-6k and stuns for 3 seconds. I understand that different classes are different, but we are both stealth classes, and as deception/madness we are even SQUISHIER than them. What exactly is the trade off here? Because I don't see it.

50 Assassin here. In PvP, Project and Shock both have an advantage and disadvantage when compared to eachother. PvP is obviously all about burst. Project will hit your target .8 seconds after it is cast, allowing you some insane chained burst within a much smaller window than is possible by Shock (this is assuming you lead your chain of burst with Project). As you guys mentioned, having the delay on Project also gives a small opportunity for heals to land, Medpacs to be used, powerups to be grabbed etc. They both have their merits. From a PvP standpoint, I would probably prefer to have Project, but maybe that's just me believing the grass is greener on the other side. I understand why a lot of people are frustrated, but I don't believe this should be first on the list of Shadow/Assassin issues.

I've done slightly over 300k a few times, I find it a lot easier to pull off on Huttball.

What he said. Numbers like that are only possible with top-tier gear/stacked consumables, and when the stars align for nothing but crits.

If a player is leading nightmare operation, you bet your *** it's their place to decide who is a good player and who is not. I'm not sure about you, but running flashpoints/operations with subpar players is a very frustrating experience. Right now, unless you're a tank or a healer there is absolutely no way to determine who is and isn't carrying their weight. The importance of an ingame DPS meter is even higher because as far as I can tell, EVERY single hardmode and above boss in the game has a hard enrage timer. If raiding is going to be taken seriously in SWTOR, Recount is vital.

Do you even know what you're talking about? "Jack of all trades, master of none. Work with your strengths.." That is definitely a contradiction. Unless you count stealthing or getting out of combat, deception/madness assassins have no real strengths in PvP. Operatives do everything we do, but better, in addition to being able to heal. The only thing they don't have is guard/taunt.

I am HEAVILY in favor of an in-game Recount. I want to know how I compare with other people of my class, other classes, and guildmates. I want to learn what the optimal DPS spec is, and what the stat weights are. I want to experiment and test other specs to see exactly how well they compare to cookie cutter builds. I want to know when someone isn't pulling their own weight in a hardmode flashpoint or nightmare operation. I want to know WHICH ability killed me on an encounter, and exactly how much damage it did so I can better prepare myself to either avoid it or mitigate it next pull.

If you want to compare it to rogues, in addition to the 3 you mentioned, Assassins also have similar equivalents to: Gouge, Sap, Kick, Sprint, Backstab, Cheapshot, and an ability similar to Evasion. You still have not addressed the issue this thread is primarily about: what our role is in PvP as deception/madness. Is it burst damage? Nope. Is it survivability? Nope. Is it CC? Nope. etc. Pick ANY category and I guarantee I can name a class that does it better than we do. Assassin is not a BAD class, it just has ZERO direction and a bunch of watered down, weak abilities like Spike and Overcharge Saber. We are a class that has stealth with absolutely no synergy with it. Unless I'm forgetting something, we have 3 stealth abilities: Blackout, Spike, and Mind Trap. The first 2 are extremely situational. They could easily change Stealth to Force Leap and the class would be almost the exact same, it would just be harder to pick and choose our fights.

How does anything I said point to user error? I was making a point as to why I am unsure of what our role is in PvP, and why I feel like we are subpar to operatives at being "assassins" I'm pretty sure I know how to play my class very well.

I honestly don't know what our role is in PvP. We have FAR less burst than operatives, very little to no class synergy with stealth, and the lightest armor in the game if you aren't using Dark Charge. Our only strength is getting away from people. Why do we not have a good stealth opener? Spike is an absolute joke and fills way too much of the resolve bar for a 2 second knockdown. In PvP, uptime on your target is not extremely high as a melee class. Sometimes you're going to be stunned or kited. As a deception assassin, unlike concealment operatives, most of our abilities require too much setup to hit hard. Want Shock to hit hard? You have to voltaic slash twice. Want Discharge to hit hard? You have to build up surging charge stacks. Want Maul to hit hard? You have to get an exploit weakness proc. Couple this with limited uptime on targets, and you have yourselves a subpar group PvP class. This is exactly why we aren't very strong in PvP right now.

Buff stacking aside, this video makes me sad that I play an assassin/shadow and not an operative/smuggler. Operatives are much stronger and the class actually synergizes with stealth. I've been dropped by Operatives in 3-4 seconds, I have never been able to do anything even remotely close to the same despite having 6 pieces of champion.

I was pretty shocked when I found out that EVERY SINGLE HARDMODE Flashpoint boss has relatively tight enrage timer (especially ones like HK47 and Krel Thak) I really do enjoy the occasional hard enrage boss where DPS is crucial, but it's become a bit excessive in hardmode flashpoints. Give us a hard enrage on the first boss, no enrage on the second boss, soft enrage on the last boss. Mix it up. People really enjoy different mechanics on different encounters. Find different mechanics to challenge us outside of a hard enrage.

Exactly why this is such a big issue to me. Stealth is supposed to be an advantage, not put us at a disadvantage for using one of our abilities. I have no problem with bosses detecting stealth, but I do have a problem when it often results in a wipe because the boss saw me even though I was further from the boss than the rest of my party.

Pretty sure it's as you guys said, it does not stack with sprint but it is definitely active while in combat.

Agreed. This is my number one issue with the game at the moment. This is the FIRST thing I looked for in the preferences when I started playing.

Completely agree. Would make tanking much less mind numbing

It's actually somewhat of a decent leveling talent if you aren't using a tanking companion.

Yup, a fix or server reset would be awesome.

I don't have a problem with the tumult cooldown or it requiring an incapacitated target, those are fine. Being able to use it on standard and strong mobs but not elites or players just makes very little sense. What exactly is this abilities purpose? Does any other class have an ability that they simply stop using once they hit 50?

Tumult needs to be reworked. It has too many stipulations: 1. A fairly long cooldown (45s) 2. Is only usable against mobs that don't really matter (standard/strong) 3. Requires the target to be incapacitated It has such a good animation, and now that I'm 50 I don't even have it bound anymore because of how useless it is at this point. Even if you have to reduce the damage, tumult should work against ALL mobs and players.