after all this said id like to start with several suggestions for some possible hotfixes. but first a bit of logic: as far as i see the game engine causes low fps when too much dmg or heal numbers are parsed. i dont think the graphics is the major problem here. if it cant be changed the only solution is to spread out the players instead of benefitting the zerg tactic. 1) to spread the players to smaller groups there have to be carrots all over the area, not just in one place. since we are omnivores we like both carrots and dead enemies. the carrots will attract people plus the people will attract more people who wish to kill them. (lets call it dynamic carrot ) now where to place these dynamic carrots? there are already 5 areas marked as objectives on the map so use these to begin with. there should also be some smaller carrots all over the pvp zone for smaller groups, maybe 4 more. 2) another way to spread the zerglings is to punish the clustered ones by the enemy team. this means that there have to be places in illum where 30 players should not be stronger than 15 players. guess what? there are already two such places but they are both near the bases and have no carrots installed. THE CANNONS. we need more of them at locations where people expect to find carrots. 3) the faction imballance issue. this is one of the core problems of pvp. there cant be any reasonable pvp without teambalance and also no open pvp without faction balance. in the long run the imperials have to be motivated to switch to the republic as well as new players have to be motivated to start a republic charchter. this is sad but true. i dont know what to do about it besides boosting xp and other things which make lvling easier for the republic. so far illum has created a valor imballance in favor of the imperium which also has a great effect on warzones. synopsis: if the game engine does not allow mass pvp 1) place boxes with mercenary commendations at the 5 pvp objectives in illum as well at minumum 4 other locations in illum. 2) place (indestructible) cannons usable by players (factionbound) at some of these locations to scatter the masses of bloodthirsty players 3) try your best to blance the faction population as soon as possible P.S.: i know i sound like a crybaby when i tell that everyone i play orginzed pvp with (republic) have already canceled their subscriptions due to class and faction imbalance in combination with the pvphostile gamengine. this is sad, when we started we liked the game a lot but the endgame was just too disappointing.

we all shulb be happy to see dumb mercs/commandos in pvp becaus if they used all their abilities in the optimal way they woulb be able do deal over 7k dmg in one gcd from time to time. mercs/commandos are definitely op. they just deal too much dmg waerimg heavy armor and having an absurd aoe knockback ands stun and blind. they can also heal themselves for a small amount which is not that small concidering the instacast buff. i play a commando on lvl 25 and a sentinel at valor rank 59 and full t2 pvp. it is just rediculous how much dmg output the commando generates out of nothing, just with grav round and high impact bolt+sticky grenade. the kyting argument doesnt work because it implies that u dont attack the commando/merc nor anyone standing in his los. it also points out the rediculously high dps of the class as u are forced into cover just because of one player. a full t2 healer casts his 2k noncrit heal for 2,5s during this time a merc/commando has almost dealt 3k dmg with two casts of his main dmg ability without cd.

actually you can go by the whineindicator. if noone whines about a class it is underpowered.

most players want both pvp and pve, you suggestion wpuld force them to lvl at least 2 chars up to 50 which is borign when you do it he second time and takes time many players do not have. i like the fact that pve gear is useless in pvp but thats somehow unfair as the pvp gear ist not that bad in pve. the major problem with the pvp gear is that anyone can accuire it solo quite easily wheres pve gear is only accuired if u effectively play pve which u can only do with a group. this fact point directly at a pvp issue: no teamplay is required to gera up in pvp, u can farm your gear without winning a single wz. this is an mmo, solo players should be punished by the mechanics, teamplayers should get a benefit in both pve and pvp.

rift introduces the role system wich was really nice. u coul choose between up to 5 different spect when u were out of combat. there were only 4 classes with 8 different skilltrees of with you had to choose 3 for each spec. its nice but doesnt exaclty make balancing easier. there are several basic problem in swtor: for most classes there are 3 (often 2) considerable specs to chose from. thats not a lot especially as hybrid specs are for most classes justs nonsence. another problem is the handling of instant abilities which seem to have an hidden activation time and someteimes even get interrupted. so its difficulst to argue about abilities which do not work as intended. the game is simply not balanced atm, there are useless specs, useless item sets, unbalanced factions and an exrem overhang of inquisitors/consulars combines with neraly no snipers/gunslingers(because their main class mechanics is bugged to the edge of unplayability) and a continuously decreasing number of melees generally and sentinels/marauders in particular. also healers are too weak in pvp due to the 30% debuff and rediculous costs of healing abilities combined with extreme and hard to avoid dps AND burst of mercs/commandos and sorcs/sages most of the dmg in pvp is not effeted shield offhand of tanks, elemental and internal dmg reduction is not linked to any stat ingame. well at least there is no lifeleach or offensive despell. and there is also no disorientation which causes charachters to fall through the ground.

pommel strike and svage kikc are for nps only. they work only on normal, weak and strong targets. enemy players are neither. its a tooltip fail because its does not become clear that this only works on npc wothout testing it. it also doesnt work on bosses as they are immune to cc.

i am playing sentinel from the very beginning in pvp, ive tried every spec for quite some time alway in a team of at least 4 players with heal. i use all abilities and the right rotations for the 3 specs and came to the following conlusions: - the class lacks mobility more then any other melee due to the fact that we need to stay for at least 6s in 4m range of the enemy to apply significant dmg. sentinels/marauders have very little cc so they need mobility. the force leap on 12-15s cd is strong but ohter classes have aoe knockbacks on 20s cd and stuns with 30m range plus snare. other melee classes have their burst just at the beginning of a fight whereas sentinels/marauders need to buid up focus and apply a slow on the target first. if i get knockbacked 3s after i forcelaped to my target i have applied one skill of my combo at best which did not deal any reasonable dmg. since the imperial faction has (estimated) 50% inquisitors i get knockbacked a lot, often twice in a very short time. (huttball is just rediculous against 4 inquisitors with force speed and aoe knockback) - slash and blade rush have too low basedmg. it inflicts 1200-1500 crits (t2 pvp gear against t2 pvp geared enemy). this is the non critical dmg of the grav round/heatseeker missile of the commando/merc who wear heavy armor. (they crit with 2500) yes i can compare these abilities for they have equal costs and maximum application frequency. one has 30m range and 1,5s (=GCD) casttime (and an armour debuff) the other has 4m range and is instant. survivabiliy looks fine to me. rebuke, force camo and guarded by force are very strong abilities. espcially the focus spec is very sturdy. sadly force sweep does not hit moving targets. (force sweep is a pbaoe that has a 1,5s animation an a 5m radius but eplodes at the position the ability was activated, not whre u stand when the dmg actually is dealt, so basically ~7m behind you) here come my suggestions: 1. rebuke/cloak of pain should absorb one knockback every 8s. (i am not shure about the 8s but the direction should be clear) 2. 15% movenet speed should be accesible for any spec in any stance. (as it is for shadow/assassin an scoundrel/operative) replace the defensive form of ataru to increased defence chance instead. 3. increase the dmg scaling of the offhand sabre to buff only the weapon dmg based abilities. /B] in my oppinion the force abilities are quite balanced in their dmg with the exeption of blade storm which is a little bit (10-15% maybe) too weak for its focus costs an cooldown. with these changes plus the animation fix the class would definitely shine in pvp and pve

of all dps classes (which means all but guardian and venguard) the sentinesl has the lowest dps if all classes are specced optimally and are operated more or less effeiciently. well sentinels only have 3 different dps trees which means that the class should be able to compete with any dd in pvp and pve. now try to outdps a scoundrel a gunslinger a commando or a sage. ene a shadow ha a greater dps output when dps specced. sentinel is just not melee dps incarnate at all. as far as i understand it was designed to be dps since there are no other possibilities to play the class. dpswise it should be at least in line with the gunslinger. besides, combat has the lowest crits indeed but it also has ataru procs which do allright dmg. in combat u have a 50% chance that an attack deals (with champion gear) 300-400 extra dmg and up to 700 when it crits the interface just fails to show all the numbers. once again i'd like to piont at the fact that strike deals only little less dmg that slash or blade rush. (998-1101 by strike and 1202-1400 with slash, even less with blade rush). its not like out strike is op, compareable abilities of commando and gunslinger have the same dmg.

i also use combat in pvp. ive tried all other specs including some hybrid bulds but there are actually only 3 useful bulds: watchman, combat and focus. watchman has from time to time sick dmg output but lacks mobility and is too focus intense to be able to interrupt your target or use crippling throw. its a good 1v1 (dots->more dots-> foce camo) but it lacks gap closers. all dots can be despelled by an sorc which are about 30% of all imp players. i tried focus and it seemed reasonable at first because of 7% dmg reduction, the good burst, some mobilitity (zealious leap+40% movement speed after it), trancendence which genereats 10 centering and guarded by force on 45s cd with the set bonus. BUT: the damn animation of sweep takes too long to hit a moving target, it takes about 1s for the ability to activate but then it is applied at the position u hit the button and not at the position u currently are. combat stay my favorite buld because of: 15% movement speed, the reliability of the primary dmg combo (blade rush-> precision slash-> blade storm -> master strike) 45s root/slow despell best thing: u have 9s of interrupted root (rofce leap->master strike -> crippling throw) which is not despellable and is not effected by the resolve mechanics (u can still apply root when the white bar is full)

did anyone notice that strike deals nearly as much dmg as slash? i think there is something wrong with this. our 30% enhanced crit with blade rush is as high as a noncrit of a grav round which has 1,5s cast time and 30m range. atleast the animation issues have been annouced being in work.

the piont is that if your rotation combo works out perfectly u deal as much dmg as a mecenary/commado but if the combo fails due to cc you stop dealing dmg at all. in my combat spec i can hold a marauder off of my healer for at least 12 seconds with roots and pacify. during this time he is not able to put a slow onto my healer. when i attack sorcs they either start running or die which puts them out of combat at least for some time but when dealing with mercenaries (which is exactly the class a sentinel is supposed to shred due to armor ignoring buff/elemental dots) they just shoot down my healer from 30m range with some minor inconvenience caused by my interrupts and one stun every 50s. thats what i call sustained dps. i doint know how much organized pvp there will be in this game (the engine doesnt really support open pvp) but sonner or later something will have to be done against either cc or anti cc on the marauder. i fact id like to hear more responses from watchman spec now that the lvl 50 wfs are separated. another idea is to rework the zen of the ataru form. atm its far less useful in terms of dmg than transcendence.

any dd can crush a healer in 1v1. healers are really underpowered due to the 30% debuff in pvp. (in case that someone isnt aware of it: everyone gets a debuff in pvp which reduces the heal by 30%) ive tried several classes, jedi sage 50, commando 24 and sentinel 50. in pvp the commado is in my oppinion the strongest due to the heavy armor against stealty classes, the enormous dmg output which is hard to interrupt (grav round blocked->charged bolt or full auto). the commando has a huge knockback every 20s AND a small one every 9s. although i am not healspecced with my commando i can still cc any melee enemy during his defensive shields etc. and heal myself a little while i cant deal dmg due to saber ward or pacify. it works quite well. (now that i know how rebuke works its quite easy to kill marauders, the time will come when everyone will know how rebuke works and then our sentinels will get 20% squishier) i am talking about high skilled group pvp where everone uses his soft cc abilities and focus targets have to be switched from time to time. i doint feel extraordinarily weak with my sentinel but the dmg output ist rediculously low regarding the circumstances under which i deal dmg.

i dont quite understand why people mesure their skill in overall dmg in warfronts. especially in huttball you mustnt kill enemies who are not in the middle or defending as they will respawn 5m from where tha ball has to go. in voidstar only the first door has to be cleard from enemies, after the bomb has been planted you shouldnt kill enemys so that you dont get to meet them at the next door. only in domination killing has a purpose but interrupting has a much higher value. sentinel/marauder isnt completely senseless and surely isnt heavily underpowered but still, besides the animation problems i still think that the way our combos work we lack either anti cc or dmg. maybe its not as much the overall dmg but its sustainability. besides: why should wachman be better than combat in pvp? it hs less mobility and less cc. it also utilizes dots which disqualifies your targets from soft cc. what if u need switch your target? watchman's full dps start only after 30s of fight, hows that good for pvp? last but not least: why should a melee full dd with medium armor deal less dmg than a ranged dd with heavy armour that can also heal himself?

lvling was not exactly what i had in mind. pvp is of greater importance to me when talking about balancing. ive tried several classes n pvp, in a group as well as on my own. my experience is that the sentinel is the one with the least dmg output but greatest mobility. the dmgoutput of the sentinel in pvp relies on combos, in my case it is precision strike->blade rush->blade storm. this is a combo with a 15s cooldown which has to be executed in 6s. it often gets interrupted by knockback, root, stun, force speed. if this combo (which is the shortest of all specs) is successful it deals about 4600dmg in during 4.5s. a commando deals during this time at least 4500dmg in form of tree grav rounds plus 2000dmg with the demo round if nothing of this is critical. this combo has a cooldwon of 15s and 30m range nd is followed by a high impact bolt which deals 2k dmg and is instant. grav round debuff lasts for 15s so if the combo gets interrupted the dmg comes out slower. sentinel is sustained melee dps in my understanding but i lacks: - a bit of dps - lots of sustainability am the only benefits of sentinel is the force leap, the healdebuff and the great ecape abilities. trancendence is also great.

the focus thing is the core machanics of this class, no matter how long the fight lasts we have nearly the same effeicieny at any given moment. this would just break the whole class mechanics and will certainlymake the class op as u can finish your comlete combo just from the start. i think the first things on the balacing agenda shoul be: 1) fixing the animations (!!!) 2) buff the dmg by 10-20% OR add some cc resistance OR add force pull 3) i'd like to put some of my abilities into a macro (dispatch->blade rush-> zealous strike-> anytimer) sentinel/marauder is the only advanced class that can't do anything but dmg thus it should be at least a full scale dd in pvp and pve. it isnt right now. some people keep telling that it is possible to do dmg and that there are lots of sentinel who are top dmg in warfronts but how often do you see a top dmg mercenary/commando? they basically need just 2-3 abilities which they can use at 30m range to deal a vast amount of dmg, especially burst dmg. for a well played sentnel/marauder there sure are possibilities to do serious dmg and lots of other things in warfronts but how much dmg would a well played merc/commado or basically any other dd do? if a class is harder to play it should also have a greater potential. i dont say we should deal as much dmg as any other dd but it shouldnt be 40% less than other dds. iv tried commando and sage. i dont like their mechanics quite as much as of the sentinel but they are just much more efficient at what they are designed to do and both are more versatile than my sentinel.

my problem is that sentinels/marauders are not quite as effective in combat as, say mercenarys/commandos because of cc. ive looked at the basedmg of main skills in comparrisson to commado at lvl 20 in a warfront and it showed me 2000 basedmg in the toolip of grav round whereas it shows me barely 1000 when i look at blade rush or slash on my lvl 50 sentinel with 500 expertise. i'd say one may compare these abilities with only one exeption: blade rush can be used on the move but has only 4m range instead of 30. i accept that these abilities shouldnt do the same amount of dmg but 50% is a bit harsh. i suggest to buff slash+bladerush+blade storm+cauterize by 20% in their dmg. the immunity against knockback and/or root woul be nice. it would perfetly fit instead of the rebuke/cloak of pain buff in the combat/carnage tree. rabuke/cloak of pain should grant immunity at least against knockbacks. the next thing i'd love to have is a force pull (hapoon-like skill with 30m range) maybe master strike should be allowed to use on the move but i am not so sure about this. atm it rarely hits a non stunned target, even though ive skilled the root on it in the combat tree.

my overall experience is that sentinel has the most difficulties when questing. ive tried several other classes, especially commando/merc is way smoother. but thats not important when u are lvl 50. the problem we have is o bring out dps onto the target. the dps ist not the highes in the game, being melee dps it should be either more dmage or more less penalty through cc. our advantages over other classes: -heal debuff -lots of escape skills (force camo is just great) -great mobility hence the leap/charge - WE ARE NEVER OUT OF AMMO/ENERGY/FORCE our disadvantages: -melee range for most skills -low everage survivability -medium dps output compared to other dds with energy/kinetic dmg. so basically the class is a fightig mashine equipped with lots of useful abilities for teamplay but overall slightly too weak. what could be tweaked without imbalance? a greater boost in dmg would make the class op in teamplay because of the healdebuff and the mobility in combination with a guard and descent heal would be just too strong. boosting survivability would result in heavy imballance against tanks and heavy armoured dds. the combat tree ist made for killing tanks because of the armour ignore. adding cc abillities would be also hard to ballance and only leads to even more cc in the game. my suggestions: 1) rebuke should grant immunity to knockback. 2) precision slash should last for 3 or 4 attacks fpr 20s instead of 6s to grant a better chance to apply this skill in full effitiency without make it stronger as such. (due to roots/stuns/knockbacks the buff often wears off before even one ability could be activated)