Sorry, Cure/Cleanse is worthless for the situation described - attempting to remove a Mara applied snare so you can kite him. You need to be constantly snaring the Mara because your snare only lasts 2 seconds. Already with Rapid Shots you only have about a 70% chance of activating your snare. In contrast the Mara's snare lasts for 12 seconds and has an auto chance of procc'ing. If you make the battle all about who's snare lasts longer, you are going to lose. Or lose even faster. As the case may be. The subclass that does get mileage out of Cure/Cleanse are the Operative/Scoundrels, particularly the healing versions of those subclasses. They can cut the damage they are taking from a Merc dps by 40% or more simply through the timely use of Cleanse. DoT Marauder builds also have problems here but since their DoT tail isn't as long, they are less severely impacted. DarthBloodloss, I understand where you are coming from. But contemplate this - once you go into ranked warzones that have a deep queue, you are likely to be facing opponents that have skills comparable to your own. At that point using increased player skill to compensate for your subclasses inherent weaknesses runs out of gas. Indeed this is why the very few Merc dps left are the best ones - all the poorer players have already been flushed out because they were not viable.

Actually it's meant to weed out the Merc dps from the real subclasses. You know, the ones with a future. Sal-Makor uses long cast time abilities that are extremely powerful. Like human players do. You must interrupt these. Multiple times. As a Merc, you can't do that. You are the only subclass that can not do that. Now you see what it will be like in level 50 pvp.

I've mentioned this before, but the reason that Merc dps (and Operative dps) won't get fixed is that BW doesn't think there is a problem. And they have the statistics to back that up. Their ingame stat collection shows that the meta average productivity of all the classes are within 5% of each other. The problem is that said stat collection does not control for player skill. And who is left playing Merc dps in wz? Since so many people have abandoned the class, it is skewed towards highly skilled, highly geared players. In contrast the meta averages for PT, Mara and Assassins are flooded with low gear players who have flocked to those subclasses and are not yet geared, nor skilled in their new professions. Once you control for player skill, it is evident to all players that Merc dps sucks. But the meta averages don't show that. The inability of BW to understand how player migration between the subclasses distorts their ingame stat collection has haunted ToR play balance since launch. It is the reason why we had the infamous double nerf to concealment operatives. The first nerf culled out the low performing players in the subclass, so the meta averages actually rose after the nerf. This lead directly to the second nerf. The same pattern later repeated itself for Arsenal Mercs. The bottom line here is that ToR made some real advances in the state of the art for MMOs in its statistics collection abilities. But BW lacked the human skill to interpret that data correctly. And when you hear them talk about subclasses hitting damage output targets, it is clear they still do. That's the reality of the situation.

Incorrect. PT Pyro could *theoretically* proc PPA RS every OTHER GCD. Since it takes one GCD to actually consume it by using RS. Moreover although PT Pyro can no longer theoretically proc PPA RS every other GCD, they were compensated by having the actual percentage chance of proccing RS increased. The net result was a better chance to actually get a RS when you need it, with the side benefit of actually getting some heat resource relief because you weren't spamming FlameBurst as often.

Having a Merc dps solo guard a node in Alderaan is a horrible idea. Because they will lose 1v1 EVERY TIME against a player of equal skill. Just another situational example of why you shouldn't have a Merc dps on your team in important matches like ranked wz. And when solo attacking or being caught between a base, the combat is almost never a clean (all abilities off CD) combat. It gets right back to what I was saying before - abilities with longer CDs are more likely to be on CD. Oh I realize Merc dps has cleanse. But it is useless. In the time it takes for you to switch targeting to yourself, cast Cure and then switch targeting back to the Mara, the Snare you have on the Mara has expired. So what did you accomplish? NOTHING. Both dueling players still have the same speed. The Mara is still on you. AND the Mara got a free GCD to do some damage to you, while you just wasted that GCD and spent 8 heat. USELESS.

So I read this post a few days ago, and thought it had some good ideas, although deeply flawed. I decided to let it sit and see if anyone replied. Nothing. So simply in the interests of information exchange, I think the OP deserves some feedback. By way of background I play a V100 Merc Pyro and a number of other subclasses in PvP. Including a Marauder. First off, the scenario you describe is highly unlikely to occur. We all know in warzones, the clean 1v1 (with both players having all abilities off CD) occurs extremely rarely. More common is that the abilities with long CDs are on CD, and those on short CDs are not. More to the point, JetBoost, properly skilled, is on a 25 sec CD. ForceCharge is on 12 sec CD. Therein lies the problem. Moreover once other players get introduced into the equation, it becomes increasingly easy for a Mara to begin the combat not with ForceLeap, but simply by running up to the Merc. The Merc simply does not have the luxury to stop whatever he is doing and shoot at a Mara that is within a 30 meter radius every time a Mara comes within 30 meters. But more damningly, even with the hypothetical scenario you describe, the strategy you propose doesn't work against a skilled player. The use of JetBoost after ForceCharge occurs but before the Mara can use CripplingSlash is a good idea. But it relies on the passage of a GCD which is required before the Mara can use CripplingSlash. But a skilled Mara can short circuit this process by using Obfuscate which does not obey GCD limitations, immediately after landing ForceCharge. Now the Merc is screwed. He can't land the Snare via RapidShots that he needs to in order to keep the Mara off him before the root from ForceCharge expires. So by the time the Merc can move, the Mara is adjacent to him and has landed CripplingSlash. You know the rest of the story from there. It ends with the Merc dying. Every time. As long as the Marauder has skill and gear equivalent to the Merc, the Merc dies. I still think the OP has some good ideas. But as long as the Marauder has equivalent gear & skills, he will win. The Merc needs to be better than the other player in order to win. The other subclasses only need to be as good (or just slightly worse), in order to beat a Merc in PvP. That's because the Merc is the worst subclass in the game for PvP. It isn't better at anything than every other class and it is worse at everything than certain classes. It is a Pareto inferior subclass.

I use PowerShot on my Merc Pyro in ops runs. Sporadically. Here's the problem with using PS in PvE - you can get better dps by putting Rocket Punch in your rotation rather than PS. If you do that, Rocket Punch has such a short CD, that it essentially pushes PS entirely out of your sequence. It's also somewhat of a pain in the butt to use PS since you need to respec to have Muzzle Fluting. Which I never have when doing PvP.

No it isn't. Because of the declining marginal benefit to armor, there is an increasing marginal benefit to armor reduction. Thus the 90% armor pen for PT RS is worth MORE than 4.5x a 20% armor pen. But it's clear that numbers and logic aren't going to change your view. So I suggest you bring your Arsenal Merc out and ask to join a ranked wz team. How'd that work out for you? What's hilarious is that you think ranged dps should not compare themselves with other ranged dps to see if there is a relative balance between them. And I play plenty of other classes, with 6 different level 50 toons. Do I appreciate what I have with Merc dps? I appreciate that when I score 750k of damage with a Merc, I did it with the weakest subclass in the game. But unlike you, I don't kid myself into believing that my subclass is just fine. I also put up 520k damage and 80k healing in my third match on a Marauder (no prior sub 50 pvp experience) in basically full Recruit gear. With no stims, no adrenals and while entering the match 2 min late. That should give you an idea how big of a subclass imbalance exists once player skill is controlled for. Merc dps is hands down the worst dps subclass in the game. And you claiming that Merc dps has good utility is just laughable.

I don't think there is any problem on the operation side. But ranked/rated? Good luck. All the things that mobs don't know how to do - such as context sensitive interrupts, stuns and pushbacks are what good players in PvP do. Which is why Merc dps are neutered. The entire concept of a ranged class dependent on long casting abilities to do damage at range is flawed if that class has no means to maintain range. That is why Snipers do work. But Merc dps? Pfft. BW needs to admit Merc dps is borked and give players a one time chance to switch from Merc to PT. This is no different than the recent ticket for people to switch servers. Those people through no fault of their own, made a bad decision early on to belong to a doomed server. The transfers allowed those people to access a part of the game (endgame PvP) that they otherwise would have been excluded from. Same situation for people with Mercs. Through no fault of their own, they made a decision early on (lev 10) to belong to a doomed subclass. Allowing them to transfer to PT allows them to access a part of the game (ranked PvP) that they otherwi

The PT levels about as fast as the Merc. Towards the end of the leveling process, you might notice an advantage for the Merc due to the cc ability. But Merc is far from the fastest to level. My Marauder leveled far faster than the Merc.

The devs response was clearly (he stated it directly) with respect to Assassins. Not BH. In contrast, BW devs have on multiple occasions come out and said that Merc gameplay was so simple that too many players could excel at it, and that was part of the rationale for nerfing Mercs. The problem now is that simply from a comparison of best practices gameplay, Merc dps SUCKS. Combined damage/protection/healing numbers from top players lags behind that of PT Pyro by about 25%. And behind Sorc dps by even more. Now with Sorc dps, one can at least make a semi-rational excuse for that gap - Sorcs are quite flimsy. But PT Pyros have better damage output, better burst damage output, better utility AND better survivability. And if a dev thinks this is a L2P issue, then I suggest he hop on a Merc and duel any of a dozen top PTs on various servers. He won't win a single duel. With respect to that ancient video (Jedi Knight vs. Bounty Hunter), you'll note a couple of things. First The Jedi Knight's leap doesn't root the BH. That was how the game played in 1.0. That's not how the game plays now. Moreover, the Jedi Knight's actions just generally represent how people played (misplayed) early in the game's history. Note how the Jedi Knight never uses Pacify. Leg Slash? This Jedi Knight had never heard of it. Put up his defensive shields? Nah. Clearly the video was made for marketing purposes, but you get the clear feeling that melee pilots have finally learned how to "fly" their toons at the edge of their flight envelope. And once they learned to do that, they have left Mercs in the dust.

20% armor pen is huge? Please. No, 90% armor pen for RailShot is huge. 100% armor pen for FlameBurst is huge. Strong AoE? You've got to be kidding me. DFA once per minute doesn't even come close to spamming ForceStorm 5 times in a row. Nah, BH knockbacks are fairly generic. Which is to say they aren't worse than most other classes. But Sniper's are FAR better. Which brings up the issue of why Snipers have higher dps than Arsenal AND better defensive abilities. Correspondingly, why is the game designed so that PT Pyro has higher dps than Merc Pyro AND more utility? BW violated a cardinal design rule - don't make one class inferior in everything to another class. And yet here we are in ToR, with Merc dps being clearly a Pareto inferior subclass.

The comparison is relevant for dps subclasses. Obviously for healers, Merc is better. Obviously for tanks, PT is better. When it comes to dps matters, the consensus is that PT dominates Merc for endgame PvP. However Merc is viable for endgame PvE, where its cc abilities come in handy and mob aggro can be controlled so that the Merc can free cast at range.

Yes, my 750k Merc is broken horribly. The 750k happened in full WH gear (limited augments as it was in 1.2) with Rakata stims and WZ adrenals being used. Meanwhile my Marauder put up 520k and 80k heals in my third match with him (I never did sub 50 pvp with him), in full Recruit gear in a match where I entered after 2 minutes had already expired. Well, OK the Marauder actually had two pieces of BM (non-augmented), but both were armor items - both weapons were raw Recruit sabers. And the Marauder used NO stims, NO adrenals. Now perhaps you can begin to understand the magnitude of class imbalance when player skill is held constant. Just like BW, you are mesmerized by the raw numbers top Merc dps put up. And because so few players use Merc dps, the meta average numbers for the subclass are dominated by the top players. Which makes it appear as if nothing is wrong with the subclass. But once you control for player skill, it immediately becomes obvious that Merc dps SUCKS. The 750k a Merc dps can put up in a semi-static Voidstar would be about 900k combined damage/protection on a PT and well over 1 million damage/healing on a Sorc dps. This is what top players are doing.

The Avatar of Sel-makor gives a great picture of what you can expect in level 50 PvP. It's a mob that uses a powerful cast ability. Just like players do in PvP. Every other subclass can deal with that by using their interrupt. Mercs can not.

It isn't going to be fixed. The only people left playing Merc dps are the very highest skilled players who started in the class. As a result the actual meta averages for Merc dps do not look bad. Thus BW feels the class does not need help and has fallen into the trap of balancing the very best Merc dps players to average fotm PT players. You aren't going to see any meaningful changes to merc dps until after season 1 of ranked warzones. There is a *chance* at that point that someone at BW might notice that none of the top ranked teams are using Merc dps, and a *chance* that this will jolt them into action. Maybe in the Dec-Mar 2013 timeframe. Re-roll as PT or quit ToR. Those are your alternatives at this point.

Easily 15% and after you add in protection, it's a 25% differential in total productivity. Yes, I too almost always top damage numbers on my Merc Pyro. But I don't fool myself into thinking it's because my subclass is adequate. It isn't. The fact that you actually use Powershot tells me a lot about why you have difficulty understanding this. I'll simply say that in the multiple matches where I've scored over 750k damage while using a Merc Pyro, I might have used Powershot once. COMBINED across all those matches. Compare that to a PT who is going to use FlameBurst 50-80 times in a match.

C'mon we all know the truth. Merc/Commando dps is the worst dps subclass in the game. Period. What's more it isn't the case of "they do X better than PT/Vanguard and Y worse, with Y happening more often". They do EVERYTHING worse than PT/Vanguard in PvP. Worse dps. Check. Worse burst dps. Check. Worse defending teammates. Check - no taunt, no AoE taunt. Worse interrrupting. Check. Worse AoE. Check. Worse Huttball utility. Check. EVERYTHING that the PT/Vanguard does, the Merc/Commando does worse. What does the Merc/Commando do better? Stand in a corner and self heal when you are at <10% health, which *MAYBE* allows the Merc/Commando to cut down the length of his Rejuve/Reload by 0.5 seconds over what it takes for a PT/Vanguard. Pathetic.

No, just change Powershot to mirror FlameBurst. Instant cast, 10 meter range, elemental damage, auto proc CGC. BW can NOT aruge this is overpowered, since it already exists for PT Pyro. Even with that change, PT Pyro is still better than Merc Pyro because it has an interrupt, taunt, AoE taunt and AoE stun.

In my 3rd match as a brand new lev 50 Mara (I had never done sub 50 pvp), I scored 520k damage and 80k healing. I was in full Recruit gear. By your own admission, Recruit gear improves survivability by 30-50% over blue lev 50 gear. Why would you NOT use it? It doesn't really even cost 320k to use, since you can sell it and recapture the 320k value as you gear up.

Virtually no one plays Merc dps anymore in endgame content, so this is a low priority fix for BW.

You probably think those numbers are proof that Merc dps are sufficient, but in fact it is only player skill counteracting inferior subclass quality. And once you go into ranked matches vs. competitive teams, your player skill advantage will vanish while your inferior subclass quality remains. There is a reason why PT/Vanguard dps outnumber Merc/Commando dps 20:1 in ranked.

I don't want solo queues for ranked warzones. What I want is ranked warzones that match teams with other teams of similar rankings. And in order to do that you will need aggregated queues, not more fragmented queues such as having a separate solo queue.

I've done 750k damage multiple times on my Merc. But I know the subclass is gimped. Claiming otherwise would be like the professional cyclist who after coming in 6th place in a race with a 10 pund deadweight attached to his bike says, "There's nothing wrong with my bike, I just beat 90% of the people in this race!". And the healing capability on Merc dps IS worthless. Compare that to the approximately 10% boost in productivity a PT Pyro gets from his free, instant cast taunts. For a same skill player, they will score 25% more on damage/protection/healing combined on a PT than on a Merc.

I fundamentally disagree with this line of thought. People are used to thinking about PT this way because of their experience in warzones to date which has been dominated by the 1v1 encounter. But in a match vs. highly coordinated opponents, the battles are longer and and there can be a role for sustained dps. The problem for Merc dps is that not only is their burst lower, so is their sustained dps output. And they can not make up for this via other utility methods. Frankly if your PT/Vanguard is only focusing on his burst dps and grappling, he is NOT near his full potential. The PT/Vanguard's AoE stun can single handedly turn the tide of a battle for a node if used correctly. Correspondingly his taunt and AoE taunt can easily add 10% productivity to his damage numbers, boosting his overall damage/protection/heal numbers to 25% greater than a comparably skilled Merc player. There is nothing the Merc Pyro does better than the PT Pyro - and certainly not survivability where the PT/Vanguard's interrupt is the deciding factor.