I agree with this in principal, however I also think that it can get frustrating to face pre-mades over and over again. Overall you probably better off just sticking it out and taking your beating... You're still getting medals/valor albeit a bit more slowly.

Great tips! Thanks! How long does the targeting last? Do you have to re-target them each time they respawn?

I realize this is sort of a newb question, but what's the most effective way to spot a healer on an opposing team? As a sent, sometimes my most effective role can be to make an opposing healers life more difficult, but often I have a hard time figuring out who to target. Is there something blatantly obvious that I'm missing?

I play a Sentinel, and I'd have to say that we are definitely not OP when it comes to carrying the ball. Yes, if conditions are JUST right (CD's, position of opposing forces, etc), we can score in a big hurry, but there are so many things that can easily throw us off track. We aren't bad at it, but we certainly aren't the most effective ball carriers in the game...

I just hit 50 recently, and after playing a lot of competitive matches in the under 50 bracket, it was quite a shock to go into the 50 WZ for the first time (even with 6 bags worth of gear). I did manage to break 100K damage with my Sentinel, but all in all, I felt pretty worthless. However, I understand that I just need to suck it up and grind my way to some better gear. I guess I can see both sides of the argument... Pretty sure there can never be a fix that will make the majority of people happy...

Heh, I just discovered this yesterday as well. I was watching the sentinel videos that had been posted over the last few days and noticed that they had a much better view than myself. After making the adjustment, things are MUCH better! Pretty much the same comments you have.

Well, I broke 150K for the first time last night. Getting better slowly but surely!

Wrong, I never said your DPS would be bad did I? I just said that you're better off not worrying about it because there is more to this game than how much damage you do. Much of the damage done by other classes is AoE, which I would argue is worthless much of the time. In a nutshell, damage without any context is a bad metric. I never said Sentinels are squishy. I said we aren't tanks. There's a big difference. Once you understand the difference you can adjust your play for the better. Whether you like it or not, it's a completely valid strategy that works. If you're team is on the offense in huttball and you manage to distract a group of players that would have otherwise been chasing the ball carrier, you're doing your job. Similarly in Voidstar, you can harrass the offensive team for long enough for reinforcements to arrive, you've done your job. The same applies for alderan. It's not all about damage. Again, trying to bolster your point by putting words in my mouth. I never said we sucked up until 40. I just said we get some stuff around 40 that makes life easier. Again, there is a big difference. I'm not debating the fact that it sucks we don't have at least one of those. I'm nearly stating that you can minimize the affect of them being used against you with a little thought and as you become a more experience player, it becomes somewhat second nature. Yes, but somehow one a lot of sentinels (myself included sometimes) seem to forget. I never said this was sentinel specific. My point was that if you are like me and not great at using a keyboard, then having something like this can make a big difference. This IS pertinent to Sentinels because we have so many abilities that we need to use all the time. I didn't know about the Naga until I read about it in these forums. I was just trying to return the favor and pass that knowledge on to others. You assume that I'm trying to get anyone to decide to play Sentinel. I'm not. There are clearly a lot of people on here who are already playing Sentinel and are very frustrated with the class. I'm just trying to help those people enjoy the game a bit more. Like them I've been just as frustrated and only recently have I really started to understand how to have fun with the class and I (personally) am enjoying it a lot. I'm not a sunshine pumper when it comes to Sentinels. The class has some issues for sure and I'm certain that, given time, Bioware will address them. This whole forum is filled with people who either swear that this class is awesome and that everyone who is having problems sucks, or the equally annoying people out to convince the world that Sentinels are the worse class ever and nobody should play them. The truth is in the middle.

Why do so many people on here have to be tools and act like they are so much better than everyone else all the time? It's human nature. The class is hard to play relative to other classes that, at least seemingly, have a 2 or 3 button path to max damage). This situation is going to lead to complaints. Everyone needs to remember that this game is hardly over a month old. Every class in the game is going to be subject to tweaking over the next year, us included.

I think you and I are pretty much saying the same thing. Those are all the things that I focus on when I'm in a war zone. How much damage I end up doing is always my least concern, but (in most cases) doing my job well will lead to decent damage. I'm only level 43, so I'm still learning, so I'm sure my damage will keep going up considerably as I learn how to make better use of our wide range of skills. As I said in my original post, I don't claim to be awesome and there is a lot left I have to learn. Everyone had different levels of skill and coordination. I think the items listed in my original post apply to just about everyone, even those who aren't necessarily "UBER" when it comes to mastering a complex class like this.

lol, I haven't bound that much stuff (I'm not coordinated enough). I just have the top toolbar bound to the main keys and the bottom bound to the "alt" version. I do it this way because I can easily reach the alt key on my keyboard without hitting the wrong key. I seem to have all kinds of problems hitting the wrong key when I bind things to shift of control. I have my middle button bound to kick so I can quickly flick it with my finger (something I'm used to from playing WoW with my logitech mouse). As you can tell I suffer from a lack of coordination...

This may be true to some degree in a pre-made, but in a pug, you play with the hand you are dealt. I could easily top 150K in most matches if all I cared about was doing damage, but I'm very objective minded. I've seen Sentinels do a lot more damage than me in a match and be a lot less useful to the overall match (like letting the ball handler walk by and score why they were fighting a group of other players). Damage is not the end all be all of this class.

I just hit 43. I haven't had Awe for very long, so I'm not accustomed to using it yet. But thanks for the tip!!!

IMO, we have too many abilities. I'd like to see them consolidated and made a bit more powerful. Right now, I have more combat related activities than I can fit in the 24 slots in the main toolbar. That's too many things to have to deal with, period. Fix that and give me a CC break that gives me a few seconds of immunity and I'd be pretty happy. I'd also like to see some of the stuns in the game replaced with mez's. That's not really a sent specific problem, but it effects us a lot.

I don't believe it's "fine", just not quite as broke as some people would like to believe. This game has a lot of balance issues right now. Some classes are very OP and unfortunately we are on the UP side right now.

Gear will come with time. It's actually a lot better for lower level players now that 50's are in their own bracket. Being a lower level player and going against a pre-made full of geared 50's was the definition of being steamrolled. In any case, PVP can be really hectic, especially for a new Sentinel. After you've played for a while, the matches will slow down for you and you'll be more effective. You'll learn how to predict and minimize the effects of all the knock backs, etc. Just have fun with it. Don't get too frustrated...

Oh, one other Huttball tip I wanted to mention... "Jumping" can make all of the difference in the world when you are trying to use force leap. There are many spots on the map where a well timed jump will allow you to force leap to the opposing ball carrier if they are on a level above you.

Sent can be very frustrating in PVP at first, but with some experience and gear you'll have a LOT of fun with it. Learn which situations to avoid and don't focus too much on your damage count and you'll have a lot more fun.

First off, this thread isn't about "L2P" thread. I don't make any claims to be "awesome" and I've never broken 150K dmg in a WZ. These are just my thoughts on what has made the class more fun to play for me. Second, in regard to the OP/UP debate, I'm in the "it needs some minor adjustments" camp. I don't think the sentinel needs wholesale changes, but a few things to even up the playing field would probably make it a pretty tough class to beat. Finally, I do mostly PVP, so I can't comment too much on any PVE issues with the sent. My personal experience has been that PVE has been pretty easy, but it moves a lot slower than PVP (at least when you are soloing). Most of my thoughts below will be from a PVP perspective. Ok, now for some tips that have made the class more fun for me. 1) You'll have more fun in the WZ if you worry less about your final damage count and more about the objectives. There are a lot of other classes that can do a lot of damage with a lot less effort. Sentinels can play a pretty important role in each of the three warzones. If you play the right role, you'll have respectable damage numbers in the end. 2) You are not a tanking machine. Avoid fights that you can't win (namely packs from the opposing team). My experience has been that the opposite team tends to like to focus down the guy with 2 sabers and we don't have any really affective way to heal ourselves. You're best off to just avoid the situation. Caveat: If a good healer has your back, you can wreak some havoc against small packs of players. 3) Learn to use #2 to your advantage. You can distract a large group of the opposition and then vanish with force camo when your health is low. This can give the ball carrier, bomb planter, etc. the time they need to get the job done. Often, this will frustrate them and make them spend even more time trying to kill you off which works against them from an objectives standpoint. 4) Things get a lot better at about 40. I'm not going to lie and say that there weren't some frustrating times as a sentinel, but at level 40, things seemed to get a lot better, between the second set of PVP armor and new abilities/skills. Between these (and a good dose of personal experience) my survivability seemed to go up quite a bit. 5) Positioning is super important in the war zones (especially in huttball). Before I became more "situationally aware", it was very frustrating getting constantly knocked into the fire, lava, etc by all of the classes that have knock backs. However, once I learned to expect it, I started immediately positioning myself for the inevitable. It will always happen some, but with a bit of effort, you can negate their effectiveness quite a bit. The same is true for voidstar and alderan. Use terrain to prevent ranged classes from having a field day with you. 6) Targets of opportunity are the best. Yes, we can go 1v1 with any class, but it's not very often that you get that opportunity in the war zones... Someone always crashes the party when you're trying to beat down a sorc from 100 to zero. For that reason, pick your targets wisely. If you see a player that has 25% health left, finish them off and then move on to the next. Similarly, don't beat your head against a wall trying to beat down someone who has someone else healing them. It's a losing proposition. Either switch to the healer and make them pay, or use force camo to exit the situation all together. 7) If you're like me and not adept at all things keyboard, look into the Razor Naga mouse. I could probably go on and on but I wont... I'll be happy to elaborate if anyone has questions and happy to learn if anyone has comments suggestions. My final though it this. Sentinel is not an easy class, but it's a very fun/rewarding class once you get through our big learning curve. If a relatively old & slow guy like me can do it, just about anyone else can too!

Thanks all, some good advice here.

What they want us to hear: "Look at me! I'm awesome and you obviously suck" What we actually hear: "Look at me! I'm socially inept and I compensate for it by baseing my sad life around how good others perceive I am at a video game"

Why do people always have to act like such tools on here?

I have a lot of trouble passing in Hutt ball as well. I know how the passing works (AE), but more often than not, I click to pass and it does nothing. Probably works about 1 out of 5 times for me. I think it might be related to the severe ability delay that I get on my Sentinel while in PVP.

Yes, there are sections and medals related to objectives, but they seem to hold less weight than pure damage/healing. Take Hutt ball for instance. If you attack/kill the opposing ball carrier or heal your own ball carrier, you should get more credit than someone who is deathmatching half way across the map. I'm not looking for wholesale changes, just give more credit where credit is due...

I don't disagree with the suggestion of penalizing people who leave either. HOWEVER there is one major caveat to that: They need to fix a few major bugs first. I've never left a warzone because we were losing, but I have left one because a) I somehow fell through the floor into space and it wouldn't let me return to the med center or b) My character froze up (perma-stunned) and the only way I could get it to reset was by leaving. If those were fixed, then yes, penalize those who bail on a losing match.