The idea of a Starkiller grip, ninja style dps class has always been very appealing to me. Something between a Carnage Marauder and a Deception Assassin in terms of dps style.

It's a matter of comparing burst vs sustained dps. Due to the nature of the game, PvE bonuses tend to go to the latter, where PvP bonuses to the former. Always exceptions of course. I run the PvP stalker bonus for my Infil-based builds, and the PvE stalker bonus for my madness based builds, other than 0/14/27, which uses PvP stalker.

Meh, if I'm in a rush to get my daily done, I'm in a rush to get my daily done. Besides, it's not always like that. Just yesterday I had an insta-pop, and was like "Oh here we go, backfilling a stompfest." But I wanted my daily done before rushing off to a new years party, so I took it. Turns out I came in on the winning team, and I left that warzone 10 minutes later with 2 added to my daily.

Yea, I also found this to be the toughest boss of the entire consular story, except for the very last one. Swapping the companion to passive for the aoe was the only way I was able to do it. The final one though, I did have to go and get a friend, but that possibly is due to me facing him at 49, since I rushed my class story in order to enjoy being top of the PvP heap for a while.

0/14/27 is the topic of a lot of discussion on the assassin forums. Look around there for a bit for some great info on it.

The 600k was just in reply to the other post, she often does far more. The second part of my post, about beating the smashers and PT's, and doing it basically EVERY GAME is what baffles me.

Just saying, I've got a Guardian buddy who does that as Vig. She'll outdamage all the lolsmashers and PT's any game that she's not stuck node guarding. I haven't a clue how she does it, its just insane.

And here I thought we might have actually gone back to something productive. Not on these forums I guess.

Responses in yellow.

IMO, the tank tree does need some minor adjustments to the amount of damage it can put out. It can't be anything major for PvE's sake, but there are a ton of talents in that tree that are for doing damage, not tanking. Makes no sense to me at least. Shadow is my main class, and I'm tired of being forced into a build I find boring because none of the fun builds are desirable. At the same time, both our dps trees need some more love IMO. Any nerfs to the tank tree need to be equaled out in buffs to Infil and Balance. There needs to be good reason to go all the way to the 31 point talent, rather than just hybrids. I have not played Balance enough to comment, but I think I can speak about what Infil needs. Clairvoyant Strike is a pretty big joke right now. I think that it would be a good idea to give CS an increased chance to proc Shadow Technique. I'd go so far as to say 100% like Carnage Marauder's Massacre proccing Ataru, but that might be a bit OP. So maybe 50%. This would increase the damage of CS by itself, and also make building stacks for Breach easier and more reliable. Those stacks are far too annoying to build up currently. Profundity is also a complete waste of 3 points, but is necessary for Exit Strategy. I propose reducing the internal CD on this to 5 seconds. This also helps with the sustained Force Management issues Infil suffers in PvE. Particle Acceleration is a weird talent. I honestly think such a high damage skill has no place in the tank tree. Ideally, I'd like to see It put into the Infil tree where Humbling Strike is, and move HS down to where vigor is, since vigor is useless as well. Now, that would be OP, so some changes to PA would be necessary. Make it require Shadow Technique, have CS also be able to proc it, and instead of an auto crit, have it increase crit chance of Project by maybe 30%. There would need to be a suitable replacement in the tank tree, maybe having Project cause a defensive ability, similar to Blade Barrier that Guardian tanks get. Thoughts? Oh, and @Shin and Smash, just drop it would you both? You both have your opinions, and obviously are not going to convince the other. Can we try to turn this back into something productive?

Appears to be only west coast servers, Bastion and Harbinger are down for me, but pot5 is fine.

Your acc, crit, and surge %'s are perfect. Maintaining those levels and sitting at 1200 exp, I can getup to 680ish melee bonus damage. Dropping some power for a little more exp is up to you, as it's more of a playstyle thing. Idk if you saw the link Shin posted about reasons to possibly stack exp more than traditionally thought best, so check that out, its got some good points. For me at least, I do not take my Shadow or Assassin into Ranked games, just because it's a joke, so I sit at lower exp due to often facing undergeared people in regular wzs.

Pretty much this. I had the guy ignored for a while, but decided to let myself see his posts again just because its hilarious.

You going to share those new things about expertise? I'm curious now, as I've always run with only about 1200.

And not even that. As for w/l, I do not know what it is, but comparing my imps to my reps is a total joke. I'm in UGLYMRJ's guild, but even when we run our premades, the 4 leftovers tend to just be so bad. It takes me most of the week to do the weekly. Then I go on my Jedi Shadow, who I've reincarnated after being abandoned 5 months ago, and I won more matches solo queuing than I ever did on my Assassin. Since joining Synergy on that character, I'd say I've started winning 85% of my matches. I busted out all 9 wins for the weekly in a 2 hour spree last Friday night.

How about actually reading what I wrote, hmm? Blasphemy on these forums I know. I am not talking about the old Arika build, I am talking about Mad Maul, which does use lightning charge, and is a DoT spec. I only brought up the Arika build because the distribution of points is similar to Mad Maul. Oh, and @Shin about 23/17/1. It runs in Combat Technique, and basically is focused on getting the utility and survivability from the tank tree, while also getting the kind of pop in and out of stealth burst style gameplay of Infiltration. The lower Infil points give the spec the big Shadow Strike hits, and the reduced cooldowns on Cloak. The changes to Masked Assault also make it a very tough spec, probably the tankiest spec available. For this reason it's a pretty decent ballcarrying spec, but still just a wannabe Guardian for that. Some people swear by the spec, but I along with many others just see it as a bit of a gimp spec, trying to do everything while succeeding at nothing. It lacks the Balance utility of 23/1/17, and while big SS's and tankiness are nice, I just feel its not worth giving up the other stuff. Fun in regular games sure, but what spec isn't? LOL at all the kids crying about shadows being OP. The class isn't wanted for competitive pvp at all outside of standing half afk node guarding the whole game. The class excels at 1v1 duel type play, which it should, but it's a niche that can be ignored very easily. For any other dps roles, Pyro's and smashers will always do the job better.

Here's what I came up with. Minuscule more bonus damage than you haha, but really no change. The difference was more noticeable in the regular WH stage where I had about 30 more bonus damage than most other min/ maxed people I saw, while keeping the 30% crit. I find the best results come from full power mods, and getting any needed crit from augments. http://swtor.askmrrobot.com/character/0d792da8-0179-4b1a-8a7a-df4d39d5bf4d That's mostly 26's, putting in all 27's, and swapping 2 crit augs to willpower is the end result.

You guys are just trying inferior versions of the already known and popular 0/14/27 Mad Maul build. Basically the old Arika build grabbing the new and improved Masked Assault, and in Force Technique. There's some good info on it in the Assassin section.

I'm thinking for 17/1/23, and maybe even all balance based builds, it might be best to use the 4 piece pve stalker bonus for the crit chance boost to double strike.

While we are at it, here's mine, for mostly WH, with only 3 pieces EWH. When I put in all 27's, I came out with (barely) more bonus damage than Shin, but did not save the profile I'll update it at some point. I find that going full power mods, and getting my crit from augments/ willpower allows me more bonus damage while keeping a comfortable crit level. http://swtor.askmrrobot.com/character/d2e2b3fa-3801-4369-a7e6-2a052c6262bb

Techniques are essentially a passive buff that effects your own character while they are active. The tooltips will tell you exactly what they do. As for the skill trees, Kinetic Combat is the tank tree, Infiltration is a burst dps tree, and Balance is a sustained, DoT dps tree. In a KC build, use combat technique, use shadow technique for Infiltration, and force technique for Balance builds. Often the trees have skills that are related to the effects that a particular technique gives you. For example, shadow technique has a 25% chance to proc some extra internal damage while the technique is active. There is a talent in the Infiltration tree that increases the damage of one of your big abilities (Force Breach) by 6% every time shadow technique's effect occurs.

I'm rerolling my original 50, my Guardian. But that's really just because BW refuses to do paid transfers, and I'm sick of him being cut off from the rest of my toons.

I'll gladly trade you right now. If i do get lucky enough to find my way into a competitive game, I'm stuck half afk guarding the friendly node while my team gets to actually do something where the action is. Node guards are really all that makes the class wanted at all. Is that doing the objectives? I guess so, but its not fun. Oh, and you won't be seeing more assassins like Shin, even if warriors do get nerfed. The only people who would leave warriors to go to assassins are FOTMers, and I guarantee no FOTMer has Shins skills.

Awwww poor baby. The thing with smashers, is its easy. It's a joke to be able to do what the spec does. Playing the assassin like Shin does takes tremendous skill. And even with that skill, the class struggles to find homes in competitive pvp. Your PT always will have a home, your sniper will too if you're good. Operatives are a must these days. Assassins are node guarders at best, and ignored at worst. So no, no nerfs.

Honestly, I do not see the point of this build, at least for my own playstyle. It just seems to give up a lot of Balance's damage from the top of the tree, and lower Infil points, all for what seems to be nothing more than 20% force regen. When I play full Balance, I put 2 points into Sharpened mind, and I never ever have issues with force. I can even afford to use project for more than just keeping the Twin Disciplines buff up. Whether that's because I play Balance wrong or whatever, I don't know. I'm greatly anticipating a video more dedicated to explaining your new hybrid, because I must be missing something. Nevertheless, the new video is amazing as always. Glad to have you back.