Your other videos are entertaining. I'm sure your future ones will be as well. (I mute the music because we differ on musical taste but for entertainment factor, they are worth a watch.) Your build works for what you stated: solo defending and capping nodes, but the person you're arguing with above has a point. Versus competent opponents who know CC times and have cc break available, in rated warzones you're certainly not going to be triple ccing and solo capping a node. Entertaining, yes...I got a few laughs watching and it's fun when it happens while playing. Your build will be even more viable with the removal of on demand burst relics and adrenals in warzones as you'll have an even easier time surviving. While you seem willing to answer some questions of "fans", if you want to attract viewers to your twitter page and videos, you might want to rethink how you respond to people who have a difference of opinion than you. The above poster had a legitimate argument. The fact that you used the forums to argue with a guildie over who won a duel in another thread, while entertaining (and after reading the whole thing I'm inclined to believe you made the better argument), in my opinion actually drives people away from wanting to watch your videos.

Entertaining videos. Thank you for posting. I enjoyed them for the fun factor and it was nice to see something different than typical pvp videos of concealment operatives. The spec works great obviously in 1v1 situations. It allows good players to just wear down opponents and it works nicely for what the OP said it works for...solo guarding nodes and obviously duels. I would argue that any well-played tank assassin could guard a node just as well if not better. The spec is great for Civil War and Novare Coast, decent for voidstar, and mediocre at best for huttball...You're not going to keep people up and you'll drop fast when focused...(not a knock on the OP...but good teams WILL focus you if you're healing, and your dps is insignificant.)

EVERYTHING in pvp is situational and I don't like calling it a "rotation" per say but in a nutshell here's what you want to be using in each spec: 23-1-17 - Shock on energize proc - Maul on a Duplicity proc - Death Field when its CD is up. - Thrash/Assassinate to proc energize. - Ideally, recklessness/adrenals/relic popped when energize is available/DeathField is ready/and Duplicity is up...= huge burst on your target. 0-13-28 - Shock on 2x Induction stacks - Maul on Duplicity proc (will proc more often in this spec due to 30% chance) - Death Field when CD is up - Thrash/Assassinate to proc Induction and as a filler when you're setting up for burst (next step) - Ideally, recklessness/adrenals/relic popped when 2 stacks of induction is available/DeathField is ready/discharge is ready and Duplicity is up...= huge burst on your target.

You are correct on the boots for the Adept Mod...the enhancements come from Force Mystic Gloves and some other items such as eliminator's boots...2000 a pop...in other words, it's going to take quite a bit of time to completely optimize gear for power....UNLESS ranked warzones come out and they give the same amount of RATED commendations per game that unranked warzones give now of regular commendations. TLDR: Shinarika plays a LOT!

Thank you for posting the video...editing is top notch and fits nicely with the beat of your music. I use Premiere a lot for various slide shows/videos and I appreciate the quality. As for the pvp, also very nicely done. I like how you showcase the 2 specs side by side...nice use of kiting on those warriors, pillar hugging while force/cds reset...smart play period. Up until about 2 weeks ago, I largely solo-queued due to being in a guild with few people who pvped actively..as a result, a 31-0-10 spec was more suited to survival, however, I have since joined a pvp-oriented guild where the players use coordination and teamwork and we all know that makes a world of difference. - The 23-1-17 is one I have used extensively with great success. (HEAVILY used when it was 23-0-18 and raze was usable in dark charge). - In coordinated team play, there is less likelihood of someone on your team breaking your whirlwind or force lift, so the spec is more viable here. - You still have almost all the utility as you would in a 31-0-10 spec (force pulls, knockdowns out of stealth) with the exception of the aoe slow/damage reduction. Sometimes wither is actually counterproductive imo because it's a guaranteed cc breaker. We burst down single targets whenever possible while ccing others, therefore rendering wither useless during that stretch. - I can't count how many times the ranged aoe has saved a node/door cap. - The 13-0-28 is also one I used during my "chronic respecitis" phase. (This is an addiction I have sought treatment for.) - As you have said...burst and force management is very nice. Internal damage is great! - I've had people send me tells saying that I hit much harder, asking if I respecced...although they also sent me tells asking if I respecced because I'm much more squishy. - I have found that my damage in this spec (or full madness) is much higher and burst-oriented...I do not find myself dying a whole lot more than I would as darkness due to the fact that I understand it's a finesse build and don't try to stand toe to toe with a marauder or powertech...too many players make this mistake and wonder why they die fast....then come to the forums and complain that the class is broken. - My only nitpick with the "Arika" spec (and believe me it's a small one...I don't mean to sound condescending here) is that you named it (this is funny)...I think anyone who plays an mmo who wants to be good and fully understand their class tries different specs. I've used this spec (and I'm sure many others have as well)...I just don't have a good enough computer or the inclination to fraps/stream myself. I guess you could compare it to a golf swing...There is a swing methodology known as the "stack and tilt". Although it's not used by many, there are still several players who use it...the bottom line is your'e still hitting a little white ball with a crooked stick... - Anyway, thank you for posting the video...I enjoyed watching, found it informative and entertaining!

I usually open with a shock/discharge followed by wither...then thrash and watch for energize procs, use them in combination with Recklessless...when you've shocked 3 times, chain lightning with harnessed darkness. Keep the 5% miss and 5% reduced damage debufss on at all times...I know force regen is great with this build but don't neglect your auto attack with no force cost(I forget the name of it sorry) if you get low on force...the extra damage is worth it....I can't count how many times i've seen assassins with a near empty force bar just standing there waiting for it to regen... The above was for pve or if you just could beat on someone. In PvP, it depends on who you're fighting and the circumstances. I love knocking people down every 20 seconds.

I've been following this thread from the start and have played darkness heavy since I got access 2 days prior to release. I've tried other specs...I enjoy deception a great deal but I always come back to darkness. I've been running a similar spec to the OP since I hit 50. I disagree with those who say that it is ineffective against premades...If you're in a pug and the pug isn't working together yet going against a guild who is likely on vent, coordinating everything, of course your chances for success are diminished. The OP said this is great for solo queue, (and it is) but I find it shines even more with a coordinated group. I regularly queue with 1 melee dps, 1 healer, and 1 ranged dps and this spec dominates in that setup. I don't really care about damage...I'd rather do less damage, support my team by protecting a healer, and irritate people by not dying. I think it's great running into a battle surrounded/outnumbered by red name tags only to watch them turn grey and disappear, while my name tag stays green. I take great satisfaction in ensuring that the good folks at logitech and microsoft are maintaining keyboard sales...knowing that someone somewhere out there in the world is punching a keyboard because of a pvp experience brings a smile to my face. With this build: (I call it the Stealth Paladin) -If you are solo queueing and dieing more than 5 times, you're doing it wrong. -If you are group queueing, and dieing more than once or twice, you're both doing it wrong. -If you have less than 40k protection, you're doing it wrong (...this has been my focus over the past few days because I feel I need to improve here...i forget to guard people after changing positions on the battlefield...it doesn't help that it's like impossible to click on a friend but Shift+Tab helps a lot) -If you are expecting 250-300k damage and you're on a map other than Voidstar, you may have lofty dreams or a misguided interpretation of what this build is about.

I have chronic respecitis. It's not something I am proud of but in the 12 step program I am in, I'm already on step 4. Once I get to step 5, I'm going to probably respec...DOH!!! In all seriousness, I can confirm that the cost resets itself every week. This is based on the first time you respec for the week. For example, my first respec was on December 20th. I continued respeccing throughout the week and then on the 27th I went to respec and the cost was about 59k. I was willing to pay this because hey let's face it, I'm an addict. However, even though the npc said the cost would be 59k and I hit accept, a message came up on the screen that said "It's been a week, your respec cost has been reset... TLDR version: The cost resets to 0 one week from your initial respec for that week.