Yet another idea for a Watch/Anni rotation; been mulling it over for a few weeks. Don't think an idea like this has been posted yet, but there have been a lot of feedback posts and I haven't read all of them. Figured I would post it and see what people thought. Only done the most basic of models on this. Using Watchman terminology. Force Melt - 18s DOT, no CD, costs 3 Focus (or 4, refund 1) Cauterize - 6s DOT, 9s CD (or up to 12s), costs 2 Focus New mechanic for Accelerating Victory [AV] (combines some pre and post 3.0 concepts): Each use of Merciless Slash [MS], Zealous Strike [ZS], Strike [sT], and Slash [sL] has a 67% chance of building one stack of AV up to 2 stacks. Building a stack of AV immediately finishes the cooldown on Cauterize [C]. Each stack of AV increases the tick rate of your next Force Melt [FM] by 16.67% and reduces the cost of your next FM by 1 focus. All stacks are consumed by your next FM. The goal being that on average two out of every three opportunities would result in a Caut CD reset (so on average, Caut is applied 3 out of every 4 MS blocks). Filler for missed Caut proc is Master Strike. If you are unlucky and get 2 out of 3 blocks that miss proc, Master Strike will be on CD for the second block so you will have to get creative. At the same time, we are trying to build 2 stacks of AV every 2 MS blocks. 2 stacks of AV would cause FM to tick 33.33% faster meaning it becomes a 12s DOT. The 67% chance for each ability results in about a 75% chance of getting 2 stacks with 3 abilities used, and about 89% with 4 abilities used. If you only get 1 stack or 0 stacks, FM is a 15s or 18s DOT respectively and when you reapply would change. This creates a very dynamic rotation that (IMO) would also be quite difficult to master. "Average" rotation: MS - FM - C - F MS - MST - MST - F (no Caut proc) MS - FM - C - F (w/ 2 stacks AV) MS - F - C - F (w/ Caut proc) Focus needed: MS(4 X 3) + C(3X2) + FM(2X1) + MST(0) + OS(2X2) = 24 Focus generators in filler spots: FL(2X4) + ZS(6) = 14 Which is a net -10 every 24s not including two open fillers. Given that we should be generating approximately 1 focus every 2 to 2.5 seconds, this should be manageable. Because FM duration can vary as well, there are a lot of other possibilities, but since the focus cost of FM is also variable, these should, at least partially, offset. Focus needs will go up if you get Caut proc for all 4 blocks, but you would also theoretically be doing more damage. Anyway, just thought I would get this idea out there.

1) Do you main a Watchman Sent/ Anni Mara and if so, since when? I did. Sent was my first toon started January 2013. Since 3.0, have been mainly playing gunslinger for ops. 2) What time was the best state of WM / Anni and why? Mid to late 2.X. I'd probably say 2.10, but I think that's just because it's what I remember most recently. 3) What's your favourite ability and what's your least favourite ability? I don't have a single favorite, but to keep it simple I'll say Merciless slash. My least favorite now is a tie between strike and slash. Strike because, "ugh not enough focus and FL/ZS on CD, have to use it", slash because "have focus, but don't have anything better to do". (Which, in my opinion, is one of the reasons the Cauterize proc set-up made slash better. Slash is not a great ability, but having the chance to use Caut sooner because of it, makes it not seem so bland.) 4) How much do you enjoy the spec after 3.0. in comparison to 2.X.? Although I think 3.0 has some problems, and the "rotation" is too long, I do not hate it. It's just not as good as what we had. I have definitely not been playing Sentinel as much since 3.0. 5) Which was the best version put on PTS for 3.2.1.? Can't comment, haven't been on PTS. 6) Will the planned build for 3.2.1. be an improvement to what we have on live atm? Certainly doesn't seem like it, but I haven't played it yet. 7) How do you think class balance should be achieved and how should different specs of on AC get their own identity? Identity first for all ACs each of which should be unique. There are tons of factors some of which would include: melee/range, turret/mobile, aggressive/responsive, burst/sustained, defensive/offensive, resource builds/decays, etc. Once that is determined, then balance and tweak. Re-evaluate identities if something is way out of whack. Which I think is what is being done. As has been stated many times, part of the issue is the content that we have is not balanced across the different strengths of classes. There are clearly some skills/abilities which are way more important than others for most of the content. I also think the usefulness of mobility was severely undervalued for both PVE and PVP content when the initial balance was done. It's coming around, just very slowly. 8) Do you feel you have the opportunity to contribute to the improvement of the spec with your feedback? Contribute yes. Improve, no. The devs have changed things in this last cycle directly as the result of player feedback. It may not be the changes that people wanted, but I think they are at least listening and want our constructive feedback. To me, the main issue still seems to be communication on both sides. BW could definitely do a better job of responding to player feedback and setting expectations. Players could definitely do a better job in how they give feedback, making it meaningful, reasonable, focused, and constructive (not saying that there was not good feedback, just saying it was drowning in sea of less than constructive posts). 9) If there's just one thing you could change about the spec, what would it be? (please really do stick to the "one thing" bit here, this is important!) Watchman rotation/priority needs improvement. 24GCDs is too long for a melee spec (even one that is supposed to be the "most difficult"; and I actually think it was more difficult to play pre 3.0 than it is now). DOTs that don't sync with MS rotation are no good. Playing everything correctly, and then having to choose between letting a DOT fall off, clipping a DOT, or delaying MS is not dynamic it's simply not fun or rewarding. 10) What does it take to make you continue playing Watchman / Anni? It's my first toon, so I will always play it a bit. I'm going to switch disciplines if I don't like 3.2.1 though.

As many regular contributors to the sent/mara threads these past few months have said, it's hard to give valuable feedback if you don't know what the devs are and are not willing to change. If any RNG based options are out, I'm of the opinion that keeping the current watchman would be a better option than this new version.

Only problem with that is they could only be used once (unless there was also an option to "downgrade" the item to a lower level for use on another alt). Alternatively, just make the stats on Birthright and Inheritance items variably dependent on your character level. Inheritance could cover levels 11-30, Birthright 31-50 (or something like that). I personally enjoy the process of upgrading gear, but it would speed along the leveling process for those that don't want to do that, since you never have to return to the fleet/vendor.

First off, I think this is a great topic of discussion, so thanks for posting everyone (and thanks for getting the ball rolling Lord Artemis). It's been interesting to read everyone's ideas. Based on the number of viewers and responders to this post (versus most other things in the suggestion forum), I think crafting is clearly something important to many players so I hope BW takes note and continues to enhance the system. So, my opinions: Things I like about the current crafting system: It's a commodity system (in other words there is no differentiation of goods, one Advanced Resolve 34 Hilt is identical to any other Advanced Resolve 34 Hilt). A buyer does not have to search through 30 items all with the same name to find out which is really the best, and which is the best value. I'm sure some people enjoy doing this, and I know many crafters would enjoy being able to make items of different quality, but in my opinion it just over-complicates the system for buyers most of whom I don't think want to spend minutes to hours analyzing goods. There is a system in place for separating function and form for items (orange shells and mods) and both aspects can be crafted. Certainly room for improvement, but it's a good foundation. How functional items (modifications) are handled. Everyone has access to the base level (purchased from trainer), getting the higher tiers of functional items requires running more difficult content. (I say this, by the way, as someone who has not done progression raiding.) At every level, some work is required to get the highest possible quality through reverse engineering. You can preview what an item looks like on your character. Again, not perfect, but works well enough 99% of the time. Areas for Improvement: There are two glaring issues to me: imbalance between the crafting skills and lack of end game depth in some areas. In some ways, these are tied together and are really a symptom of the same problem: answering the question, why would a player WANT to spend the time and resources to level a crafting skill to the max level? For cybertech and biochem, I think that's easy to answer. For artifice and armstech, I think a case can be made. For synthweaving and armormech, I don't really have answer. Yes you can make some money from augments and augmentation kits, but there's just not a lot to DO. As people have already brought up before, I think the problem is the Cartel Market. Synthweaving and Armormech are primarily for aesthetic and not functional items, which, in the current state, puts them in direct conflict with the Cartel Market. BW/EA has no reason to give people incentive to BUY FEWER packs by making more desirable aesthetic items craftable. The other issue with crafting aesthetic items is that there are currently no meaningful "gates" (by gates I mean work, time, or money) for making these items. Schematics are either given by the trainer (not rare at all) or random drop/mission critical. Currently this makes sense, because there are very few desirable, craftable, aesthetic items, but if such items were available, a new system would be needed to help ensure rarity. Improvement Suggestion: Change How You Obtain Schematics I'm going to try to keep this as concise as possible, because I have some lengthy thoughts on this idea. So my suggestion is to implement a new schematic generation system for aesthetic items (orange shells) that would function on the front end of the current crafting system. The current crafting system would not change in any way and actual items would still be made exactly as they are now. This would be a way to add a lot more craftable armor to the game without just giving things to everyone (which destroys the market), or leaving people at the mercy of the RNG drop. It will actually give crafters something to DO particularly in the crafting professions that need it most (synthweaving and armormech, but also for armstech and artifice). I envisioned the inputs to this system coming from several sources such as faction vendors, cartel market vendors (although these would not be available until well after the packs are embargoed), and corporations/organizations around the galaxy. Each would have limitations on what you can buy based on reputation and crafting skill level. (Note, tying in to reputation means you would have to purchase CM packs to be able to craft those items...) I envisioned that you would not be buying complete schematics directly from vendors. Instead you would purchase "crafting elements" (which are essentially pieces of the whole item (think Tionese shoulder pads vs. Sith Inquisitor shoulder pads vs. Section X shoulder pads all being options for one crafting element)). Each item would be comprised of 3-4 crafting elements (for instance, chest pieces might be base layer, outer layer (armor), left shoulder/arm, and right shoulder/arm). The crafter would then combine these elements together in the schematic generator to create a "custom" item (there would be limits on what crafting elements go with each other, or you quickly end up with hundreds of thousands of combinations). A person on their crew would then attempt to make the schematic for the item, but success would not be a guarantee (in the same way that reverse engineering a functional item is not a guaranteed success). With success, a schematic would be generated which can be learned by right clicking as with any other schematic. You could now make copies of that item. There are a lot of details associated with a system like this, many of which I have ideas about, but that's the basic idea. I think it would help balance things out between the crafting skills, while still functioning reasonably well with the CM.

When I was first going through the rotation, this is exactly how I set it up for the exact reason you state. The only reason I decided to flip it, as I stated above, was for Focus management since Caut + MS requires 6 focus at the start of the window, while MS + Caut only requires 5 due to MS refund. If focus management is not an issue, then I would agree, put Force Melt right after MS, and Caut at the end of the cycle. Yes, just what I was thinking, Master Strike should go in one of your [MS, filler, filler, filler] windows where you use it right after MS to give yourself a chance to use a focus generating ability before the next MS window. LOL, agreed 36 seconds is pretty ridiculous.

On my gunslinger, the tooltips show that "Ranged Attacks" are getting bonus damage and critical chance from Aim (in addition to cunning), while "Tech Attacks" do not get bonus damage and critical chance from Aim. All other classes that I have checked this is flipped ("Tech/Force Attacks" get bonus from aim, "Range/Melee Attacks" do not), and I believe this is how everything was set-up pre-3.0. I did some quick calculations on how much damage my attacks should be doing, and it appears the extra bonus damage is reflected in the damage shown in the attack tool tips as well. (Leading me to believe it's not just a tooltip error.) Anyone else getting this? Intended or bug? Since Aim for smuggler should obviously be really low, it's not a big difference, but it equates to like 1% more damage for my sharpshooter since pretty much all his abilities are "Ranged Attacks". Plus it makes getting those Aim Datacrons more valuable. I already submitted an in-game bug report.

Did some number crunching and comparison between old skill tree and new discipline for Watchman yesterday. To preface this post, keep in mind this is all very theoretical (based on tooltips and average damage formulas), we'll have to see how it plays out with actual parses as more data becomes available. Please let me know if you see any mistakes, or things that would work better and I'll update. TL : DR: The watchman sent has been hit pretty hard with the nerf bat (I am calculating a theoretical loss of about 300 DPS on my sent at L55) UNTIL you get the Force Melt ability at Level 57, which gets you most of the lost DPS back. Effectively this means that damage has been taken away from your instant damage abilities (plus some from cauterize burn) and is now dealt out over time. Watchman can still kill high health single targets with the best of them, are probably a little better against mobs, and still have a ton of great utilities for ops. Brief Summary of Watchman Changes High health single target: still solid, especially once you get force melt Burst damage: other than merciless slash, I don't see much in the way of burst damage. Biggest hit was to Dispatch, with a damage reduction of about 15%. AOE: twin saber throw damage has been reduced by about 33% (although watchman does have a chance of getting a 100% damage buff), but Force sweep now has a utility point to increase it's damage, and it also spreads burn effects, so the effectiveness seems to be largely based on how much health the mob has since it will take a few GCDs to apply all the burn effects and force sweep them to the group. Burn Effects: Due to loss of some passive skills and nerfing of others, the critical chance and damage on burn effects is down (about 13% less chance, and 15% less crit damage), although this is mostly offset by the addition of the merciless slash debuff making the target 7% more susceptible to all internal/elemental damage. Juyo Form: Damage buff (now 1% per stack, down from 2%) and critical chance buff (now flat 2%, down from 1%/2%/3%) per stack of Juyo are both down. So at full 6 stacks, you basically have 6% damage buff instead of 12%, and 12% burn crit chance instead of 18%. However, Zealous strike also adds an effect that makes targets 5% more susceptible to all melee damage, which partially offsets the loss. Furthermore at L59, you also get a passive skill that will build stacks of Juyo and Merciless 2 at a time so you will get up to "full power" more quickly. Rotation Unlike most of the "added" skills for other classes, which were intended to replace an existing skill with a more effective version, the Watchman's added "Force Melt" appears to be an actual addition. So you essentially now have three burn effects to manage: Force Melt (18s duration), Cauterize Burn (12s duration), and overload saber. In addition there is a passive skill "Accelerating Victory" which is applied by Merciless slash and reduces the cost of "Force Melt" by 1 for each stack (with 3 stacks it's free). Once you have built up your 4 merciless stacks, merciless slash is on a 6s cooldown, so 3 cooldowns (to build up three "Accelerating Victory" stacks) =18s, just in time for your Force melt to finish burning and you reapply for free. Because the cauterize burn is now a 12s duration up from 6s, this creates a little bit of long rotation that repeats every 24 GCDs. Just like before, you can break the rotation down into Merciless Slash windows (6 in this case). Every 3rd window you are applying Force melt, and every other window you are applying Cauterize. As before, Overload Saber should be on cooldown at all times since it is off the GCD. Zealous strike has a 15s cooldown, meaning it will not fit nicely in any rotation (eventually using it immediately off cooldown would mean interfering with another ability), so I did not include it below, but you want to use it whenever you need focus and you are not interfering with MS, FM, or Caut. The other thing to keep in mind is when to convert your centering to Zen since it will give your next six burn attacks a 100% crit chance. There is probably an ideal time to activate Zen so the "right" burns are getting the critical bonus, but I did not do any computations for that. Whew, so that is a lot to keep track of (though I'm sure there are those of you who will have, or already have, it down in no time). So I think it would look something like this (MS=Merciless Slash, FM=Force Melt, C=Cauterize): 1) MS, C, Filler, FM 2) MS, Filler, Filler, Filler 3) MS, C, Filler, Filler 4) MS, Filler, Filler, FM 5) MS, C, Filler, Filler 6) MS, Filler, Filler, Filler Repeat Fillers should be used to ensure you always have at least 5 focus ready to start an MS window (non Cauterize windows you can get away with 4). You could flip the timing of FM and Caut in relation to MS (Caut before MS, FM after), but the rotation above should be easier for managing focus since if Cauterize comes before MS you must have 6 focus to do both, if it comes after you only need 5 (since MS refunds one). Since cauterize is no longer on cooldown, and if the above is too complicated, you can use caut in every MS window (every 6s), which will cut the rotation and complexity in half from 6 MS windows to 3 MS windows, but you will lose some damage since the attack portion of caut (which is relatively weak) uses up an extra GCD. So that would be: 1) MS, C, Filler, FM 2) MS, C, Filler, Filler 3) MS, C, Filler, Filler Repeat More in Depth Summary of Ability Changes (these are based on looking at my 55 sent damage before and after 3.0, same gear, same level; ‒ means worse, + means better) === General Changes === ‒ Loss of 3% Accuracy Buff from Skill Tree (this accuracy is lost and not made up for in any other way, you currently need more accuracy enhancements to get to 110%/100% than you did before at all levels) + 1H Saber: 180 Rating Hilt now does 578-868 Damage (up from 575-863) + 180 Rating Barrels and Hilts now have 1157 force/tech rating (up from 1151) === Abilities Common to All Sentinels === ‒ Loss of 36% Off Hand Weapon Damage from Skill Tree (combat gets back 25%, watchman and concentration lose this damage) = Slash: Very minor tweak to damage (less than .1% change) ‒ Dispatch: Damage Reduced about 15% (ouch!) + Zealous Strike: Damage Increased about 6% + Zealous Strike now makes targets 5% more susceptible to melee damage ‒ Master Strike: Damage Decreased by about 13% (ouch!) ‒ Twin Saber Throw: Damage Decreased by about 33% (although Watchman have a decent chance of getting a 100% damage buff from mind sear proc) === Watchman Specific Abilities === ‒ Juyo Form: Damage buff per stack of 1% (down from 2% per stack) ‒ Juyo Mastery: Critical chance now flat 2% per Juyo stack (instead of 1%/2%/3% per stack) + Merciless Slash: Damage Increased about 2% + Merciless Slash now weakens target to take 7% more damage from internal/elemental attacks ‒ Cauterize (attack portion): Damage Decreased about 2.5% (note the watchman tree skill “Repelling Blows” now increases direct attack of cauterize by only 5% instead of 30%, but is accessible at L16 rather than L26, damage calculated at L55) ‒ Cauterize (burn portion): DPS has been effectively reduced by about 40% (one application of cauterize does more damage, but over 12s, instead of 6s, same number of ticks (6)) ‒ Overload Saber: Damage Decreased by about 5% ‒ Insight (old focus tree): 2%/4%/6% force critical chance gone (typically 4% loss for watchman) ‒ Searing Saber: 15% critical damage buff (down from 15%/30%) + Force Melt: New burn ability that adds 300+ DPS depending on your gear

The repair option was greyed out, but I deleted the bit raider folder. Re-logged in to let it re-download, then restarted, and then the problem went away. Thanks for the suggestion.

I recently had to reinstall the game due to some issues with Windows. Since I reinstalled, I can't craft anything on any character. When I click the crew skill the crafting window pops up, but the list of available items is blank. I have tried messing with the filter settings, but nothing appears. When I go to the crafting trainer to learn a new schematic or reverse engineer an item successfully the item will appear on the list until I go to a new area (anything with load screen) and then it will disappear again. Screenshots showing blank crafting options, and one appearing after a successful RE. Character 1: Nothing Available to Craft Character 2: Nothing Available to Craft Character 1: Reverse Engineered Schematic Appears Temporarily

Why are people hung up on the story order? There are already tons of examples of things that can be played out of order storywise (several of which have already been mentioned in the thread). In my opinion having a variety of end game content is way, way, way more important then ensuring the story continuity of old content. I think the solution is to handle the OPs the same way they have done flashpoints. The SM version of the OP should be at the level it originally came out at (50 for EV, KP, EC, TFB; 55 for S&V, DF, DP). HM/NM mode of OPs released prior to the last major expansion (currently pre 2.0), would be at 5 levels below max level (like current "Classic Operations"). HM/NM OPs released after the last major expansion (post 2.0), would be at max level. All versions of new OPs Would be at max level. Then you still have plenty of relevant content, and you can keep the story purists relatively happy.

Based on what they said in the stream, I would agree with MisterBlackJack, it did not sound like they were planning on adding purges to healers. So I am as curious as you are as to how this will be dealt with in operations.

Yes, this is how they explained it in the stream. Only the stealth classes will have a purge ability which will (still) remove DoTs. The reason mentioned was so that they would be able to restealth since this is part of their defense mechanism. (I wonder if this will be added to sent/mara cloak ability as well?) Otherwise the opposing team could just keep a DoT on them and they would never be able to restealth. Cleanses will no longer remove DoTs, but they will remove stuns (and presumably roots, but I don't think they said that)..

There is a very simple formula you can use to "temper" your expectations on rare drops. P = Number of Possibilities (so for an event with a 50/50 chance of occurring, P=2) k = Number of Selections (essentially how many opportunities for the event to occur) N = Total Number of Possible Occurrences i = Frequency of the event Ni = Number of Occurrences of Event i in the set N For rare drops, we simply look at the chance of the event (the rare drop) NOT occurring. So i = 0. Lets use your original number from you first post for the number of possibilities. You opened 120 packs, and each pack has a chance for 2 super rare drops. So k = 240. This is another assumption, because there is likely an algorithm in place to prevent you from getting 2 of the same thing from one pack. This would only lower the odds further, but for a rare drop should not have a significant impact. P is unknown to us as this is the drop rate for the item. Lets assume the drop rate is .05% or 1/2000. I have no idea if this is right, but I think it's probably in the ball park. So P=2000. N = P^k N0 = (P-1)^(k-0) So the chance of the event "0 drops" occurring is N0 / N. For this case N = 1.766847x10^792. N0 = 1.567006x10^792. Therefore the chances of you NOT getting the super rare drop are 88.7%. The issue is not really how many packs you buy, it's that the number of packs you buy is MINISCULE compared to the total number number of packs EVERYONE is buying. That's why the drop rates have to be what they are, or "super rares" would not be "super rare".

The subscription plans are already set-up with increasing benefits (which are essentially loyalty rewards): 1 month recurring subscription: 500 CC/month 2 month game time card: 525 CC/month 3 month recurring subscription: 550 CC/month 6 month recurring subscription: 600 CC/month