Assassin Deception Spec significantly weaker per level than other classes?

[blargness]

You're over thinking the spec. Use Talos or Khem and just focus on doing as much damage as possible. Khem will die or be left with 15% HP a lot of time but it literally takes .5 sec if outside or 1.5 sec if you're inside to get him to 100%. The only time I ever focused on CCing targets was when I was running 2+ heroics solo and I'd hardly consider those types of situations "normal" for the leveling process.

 

Get moddable gear and keep your mods current. If you are wise with your credits, get some Orange gear for your companion, or use PvP comms. Keep them up to date with your level as well. Spend your first 7 comms on a planet for the best hilt you can get and just kill. It's not difficult it takes little strategy.

 

I do agree that some classes have it easier but that's just the nature of MMOs. Deception is a very misunderstood spec because most people seem to think you play it like a rogue and to a small extent you do, but not completely. I like to equate deception more to a feral druid, in wow terms, than a rogue.

 

Khem is largely worthless in a lot of the class quests. I actually kept artifice leveled ahead of myself and kept my mods pretty much up to date with advanced versions when possible. I also play for minimal downtime and I found that Khem wasn't very effective for that sort of thing compared to having Talos out.. With Talos and cycling CC's through each pull (doesn't take long to re-stealth/sap and then shock/kill my way through pulls) I pretty much never stop to seethe unless I pull something extra.

 

That said I'm not complaining at all. Having to do more than cycle through a damage rotation was quite engaging and entertaining. If you play right you can generally solo elites 2 levels above you without much trouble.

[Ekemeister]

I've played Maple Story, Dragon Age Origins, & League of Legends (not a copmrehensive list). I gravitated to stealth/assassin classes. Progressing even to the point of destroying teems as Crit/Attack DAmage Teemo. Quite a few were considered gimmick or broken but i made them work.

 

Coming into SWTOR, my goal is to make a crit/surge decep sin. For most of the game it's been considerably easy by my standards, though I have experienced what you're saying. Though i did not have problems with Zash at the end of Act 1. In Act 2, I only had problems b/c i forgot to use overload as cc and the game lagged when i pressed force cloak (no joke, died twice). After that I just slew her, and khem was also still alive since my damage pulled aggro off of him. Basically, my only challenges so far are War on Spice heroic (Tattooine: I tanked as deception), War on Spice's fatter, older Alderaanian brother, lv 44 Zash, and broodmother from Balmorra. My solution to broodmother was to switch from lightning charge to dark charge but keep the same deception talents. I won in a landslide. I'm now on Voss and am almost lv 44. Khem does die on bosses and elites, but I almost always live with more than 50% hp.

 

The game is usually very easy for me, but I usually make sure to stay at level and do all bonus quests and heroics I can. Since Taris, my toon as been at level yet still destroying all the content I come across. I originally chose cybertech for the stats too. Also, I presently don't use relics.

 

As far as damage, I have problems pulling aggro off of other tanks (dark sins & juggs). I have been pulling aggro off of tanks since Hammer Station, lol, since my shock, discharge, and maul all hit harder than my assassinate. Due to SA's independence from stealth, this class is easier to play than the traditional rogue. You simply have to take advantage of its strengths and remember to stack some crit while maintaining Willpower.

 

I actually rely heavily on the SI core abilities. Crushing Darkness & overload are your friends. Overload is that extra cc which saves your life, and crushing darkness is an amazing opener on pvp elites and bosses. When opening with CD, I sometimes almost double my dps if it crits enough. Because CD does so much dps and isn't channeled, lightning is not even hot-keyed anymore.

 

However, it saddens me that spike & tumult are gimped/nerfed to uselessness. Spike does crap damage and has no cc value. a two second knockdown means nothing when the normal 1.5 sec global cd is still applied. 825 damage is nothing. One of voltaic slash's two strikes hits for that much. Opening with Thrash does more damage than spike, costs less force, and requires less time. Tumult is more useful than spike in that it can one shot weak mobs, but so can a crit from shock or maul. I'm kinda sad that simply it can't be used on anything capable of being stunned. Nobody needs a single-target nuke for trash mobs.

 

Additionally, I ardently refuse to waste space about explaining how lacerate is a waste of credits/force. General consensus seems concurrent enough to act as "proof".

 

Finally, (We) Assassins absolutely hate the cloak bugs. Vanish means vanish. Aoe still applies. Aggro/targeting does not. As a melee caster with mediocre base damage, it takes skill to know when to jump in, and even more skill & twitch to anticipate a death and escape. This bug simply removes enjoyment and punishes experimentation.

 

I read the forums, and I honestly wish my laptop could handle fraps because assassin spec can be done. It just takes a little more planning.

Current Leveling Build

Edited January 23, 2012 by Ekemeister

[Eronath]

I hae a lvl 47 Deception Sin, i chose the class cos it sounded the most Rogue-ish (if ull pardon my use of wow terminology there) and thats wat i play best, I'v had a few problems while lvling up with a couple of class quests but nothing too major really. i annihilate DPS when im in groups with other players.

 

As someone said in an earlier post, wud u rather have to think about the abilities ur using or just mash face on keyboard and auto win like in a certain other game i wont mention twice lol

[AtaraxiaEnmity]

I just hit 40 on my Assassin who is Deception specced and got Voltaic Slash. It is simply amazing, has really replaced thrash as it's the same focus cost and improves your shock dmg.

 

I was having a lot of issues before hand, and part of it was because Khem was under geared. I bought some gear from the GTN and was good to go, also once I got my healer that made it a bit easier too.

 

Just remember to use the stuns at the right times. Low slash is your friend, you can stun'em and jump behind them for a quick Maul, or perhaps even a Tumult if you like the barrel kick .

 

I was ready to give up on my Sin and go back to Operative.. but since turning 40 I want to push to 50. It's becoming fun again.

[Bluenosedcoop]

It really is getting tiresome knowing that there's a good chance i will die if i try to take on 2 silvers that are 2 levels below me.

 

I don't quite understand how this class being so underpowered made it to launch without someone at bioware realising it.

 

I was level 42 and had to take on 2 level 40 silver level droid mobs on hoth, Before i had even moved on to the second droid khem was dead and i was at 25% health, And was me going full out from the start using all my dps abilities.

Edited January 23, 2012 by Bluenosedcoop

[Jarlhen]

I switched over from Darkness to Deception a level or so ago (lvl 32) and things die quicker! Unfortunately, so does whichever companion I have. Khem, all in level appropriate gear with some orange and blues lose a good 1/3-2/3 of his life on a normal pull. A single silver will take him down 50% easily. Of course you can just dismiss/summon him again, that's 2 seconds worth of time so not particularly slow. However, it breaks the momentum and gets annoying. That's really the only problem I've got with deception so far. And I have tried running with a DPS companion too and he'll lose 50% of his life and I'll take some damage too so it's not particularly better.

 

Might go back to darkness. I'd say leveling speed is roughly the same just that you can keep going for longer without having to stop. Just a smoother experience.

Edited January 23, 2012 by Jarlhen

[JCDIP]

My mistake, i'll be more specific. I, Alenorah, a lvl 31 DECEPTION Assassin, slayed Lord Zash at lvl 31 without ANY help from another player, and without using ANY pots. I only had Khem by my side, and I used my 20min CD.

 

So when people QQ about how they take off 1/4 of Zash's HP then die, or struggling with random quests, it leads me to believe people must suck @ this class, or are undergeared and are too lazy to actually gear up and see if it makes a difference, so they QQ here instead. I already acknowledged the Assassin was NOT as good as other classes at leveling, but if somebody is failing that hard, it is most certainly a skill issue, not a class issue.

 

Hey guess what I will stand up for my post and still stand beside it! BTW I killed her about 5 fights later.

 

Seeing how you love to throw around what you think I said let me bring you back down to earth and treat people with a bit of respect! Come to think about it, if anyone has a problem why don’t you try to help them rather than say. You suck (in lesser words).

 

First, I am not a kid!

 

Second, for you to assume makes you... well you know!

 

Third, who said I could only take off 1/4 of the health? I think I said I get her down 3/4 of health. For you math major that would be 1/4 left of total health left. Now I will give you the benefit of the doubt and just say you miss read it.

 

Fourth, My main companion was the Imp guy (Range DPS) not Val. I found out once I entered the instance that I could only take Val into the class quest, so I had to leave and gear him up. IE: I wasn't used to his attacks

 

 

Well that about covers it... I am now lvl 35 and finding my attacks are a bit easier, I kind of wish the buffs would last longer.

[Ralkora]

Honestly the only issues I've had so far are on fights that force me to use a companion besides Khem.

 

Khem is easy to gear out in gear you find along the way (heavy armor boe drops etc.)

 

MOST if not all of the convos that turn into actual fights you can stealth right as the cutscene ends and if you are lucky blackout to avoid the gold or boss lvl npc from seeing you.

 

Blow electrocute at the beginning of the fight and USE JOLT and interrupts when you see a cast bar. BIG difference.

 

 

 

The key is realizing that the majority of the time you can stealth before the fight begins if you spam your stealth hotkey. (mines mouse 4)

 

From there its a matter of CC the strongest member you can CC, have fun.

 

while you are cleaning up trash that 8s whirlwind is actually useful as well on the boss mob.

 

It's by far more difficult than say, my jedi sage was. But Doable.

 

I do believe if I was tank spec it'd be a bit easier though.

[Ralkora]

Also want to point out I do these quests same level.

 

The key is interrupts.

[Bahamude]

Also want to point out I do these quests same level.

 

The key is interrupts.

 

So... you're recommending not to use interrupts as part of the attack chain and only use them to actually interrupt?

 

I just want to be clear about the strategy you're using.

 

Thanks!

[Bahamude]

Wow. Most useless post in this thread.

 

On-topic: I leveled much of the way to 50 going full Deception with Khem and can safely say it felt weaker than other full tree builds on Assassin, Mercenary, Juggernaut, or Operative. Someone will lol by comparisons but I am simply listing the classes I have played to a high level and experimented with different builds.

The difficulty is fun and it's great to stroke your own e-peen saying how leet you are and all, but I would not say it's balanced with other classes for leveling purposes.

 

I'm in agreement with you here. I'm leveling a Sith Warrior Juggernaut after I got my Dec Assassin to 50, I found that my Warrior can solo way more things than I could ever with the Dec Assassin. My Juggernaut is even soloing elite champions, something unthinkable as a Dec Assassin.

 

Instead of posts from people who end up sounding mean spirited and like jerks (like Alenorah is portraying) let's have the folks who were able to take on Zash at the level she was at tell us what strategy or attack rotation they used to take her down. Did they use interrupts only to interrupt? Did they gear their companion as high as they could get them? Which companion did they use, etc?

 

I'd certainly be interested if there was indeed something a lot of us were missing or if the claims that it's doable are actually not real.

 

I'll level another Sith Assassin to just to test it out.

[XXThrashteraXX]

Hey Everyone,

 

SPOILER ALERT- there are some spoilers of the Inquisitor storyline below.

 

A BioWare GM asked that I post this issue here to the forums to see if we can get some community feedback regarding the underpowered nature of the Assassin Deception spec. I have found leveling mine to 50, and buying all the custom mods I can to beef up his abilities as I was leveling, that the Sith Inquisitor Assassin Deception spec is consistently unpowered for the level in comparison to other classes.

 

This has taught me to learn about and to use every single ability the assassin has and when to use it, but it still requires me to be much higher than the level and there are just not enough drops or commendations to equip both me and my companion(s). At 50 I can start decking out everyone with Xalek being the easiest one to deck out in my old gear.

 

So during my 50 level journey, I have found that I always need to be 3 levels higher than the zones I'm going in, especially when fighting gold mobs. At 3 levels higher, the fight is still very tough to win but doable tho companion death almost always occurs. At the level of the mob or 1-2 level above I have found it mostly impossible to win. It took me a while to realize that without the stealth attack combos at the beginning of each of these storyline and boss fights, Deception Spec'd assassins are always at a disadvantage. After a plethora of deaths, I quit trying to fight these mobs outright. I can remember the Vash and Thanaton in the dreamwalking quests as the examples that stand out most clearly.

 

Also for fights where the gold mobs has adds, I always have to kill the adds quickly, then Force Cloak before I die, heal, and then go back for the gold mob. Usually my companion is dead by the time the adds are all finally dead.

 

Has anyone else playing the Deception Assassin run into this issue?

 

The Sith Inquisitor is a wonderful storyline, just wished the Deception Assassin wasn't so underpowered. Please chime in if you've either played or are playing a Deception Assassin Sith Inquisitor. Thanks everyone.

 

 

I really haven't had too many issues leveling as deception. Maybe your priority rotation is wrong. Things got especially easy with talos.

[pinkfreudHC]

Whoever mentioned Xalec being the end-game tanking companion is correct. If you are dutiful in your dailies you will be able to get him in Champ gear and level 49 purple gear relatively quickly. Even better: You can run instances and get tank gear for "off-tanking" and just throw it on him. If you ever actually need it, just swap out!

[Sknife]

I've been leveling a deception assassin (37) and I agree, compared to other dps classes at the same level as me my damage is pretty weak. Also my companion dies on almost every elite, have to force cloak, go back, rezz and then kill. Sins need some love man.

[Sknife]

I'm in agreement with you here. I'm leveling a Sith Warrior Juggernaut after I got my Dec Assassin to 50, I found that my Warrior can solo way more things than I could ever with the Dec Assassin. My Juggernaut is even soloing elite champions, something unthinkable as a Dec Assassin.

 

Instead of posts from people who end up sounding mean spirited and like jerks (like Alenorah is portraying) let's have the folks who were able to take on Zash at the level she was at tell us what strategy or attack rotation they used to take her down. Did they use interrupts only to interrupt? Did they gear their companion as high as they could get them? Which companion did they use, etc?

 

I'd certainly be interested if there was indeed something a lot of us were missing or if the claims that it's doable are actually not real.

 

I'll level another Sith Assassin to just to test it out.

 

I defeated Zash at level 31, had to kit Khem Val out with the highest gear I could find, used my interupts when possible, Khem died during the fight but I was able to take her with a healing tablet.

[Bahamude]

I really haven't had too many issues leveling as deception. Maybe your priority rotation is wrong. Things got especially easy with talos.

 

Leveling fortunately isn't the issue as much as beating the storyline bosses and taking on multiple silvers or waves of opponents. The issue I and a lot of others had was that this spec feels weaker than all the others. My experiences leveling a Sith Warrior definitely appear to confirm this. But to be clear, playing a Dec Assassin is more challenging, but not less fun and the point of this thread is to see if we're missing something obvious or if the Dec Assassin spec itself really is underpowered.

 

Once I got Talos it was easy street. Gear up Talos, keep aggro off of him and you'll never go down. I found Talos made the entire spec simple to play- didn't matter what combat rotation you used.

 

I think we're all specifically interested in the strategies of those who beat shadow Zash and shadow Thanaton in the storyline quests at the level of the quest. I can see beefing up Khem with as high a gear as he can receive and beating Zash as was mentioned in the thread.

 

What I would like see is for those who claim they beat Zash with nothing but default gear for Khem give us the strategy for how they did it. So far none of the people who claimed they were able to do it have given us an explanation for how they did it. I did it at 3 levels higher than the quest level, Khem in default quest armor died and I used a heal pack but I beat her.

[Bahamude]

I defeated Zash at level 31, had to kit Khem Val out with the highest gear I could find, used my interupts when possible, Khem died during the fight but I was able to take her with a healing tablet.

 

This makes total sense. As I'm leveling my Sith Warrior Juggernaut to compare to my experience lvling my Assassin Deception spec to 50, I've noticed that gearing both myself and Vette up as much as possible early on makes a huge difference. Everything goes by faster. I went from handily beating my opponents to annhilating them. In the second floor of the Black Temple, I took out a group of 2 silvers, a wandering silver patrol, and a group of 5 trash mobs all at the same time. Pulled them all and took them all out. They never got me below half health. Vette with her top of the line dual blasters was just taking them apart from a distance while I destroyed each target I hit. So gear definitely makes a huge difference.

 

I had so much fun doing that I cleared out the entire second floor of the Black Temple several times just to level my slicing.

 

So the easy lesson here is definitely don't rely on the companion quest gear rewards. It's pretty paltry and considerably under what you can get in the auction house or from vendors.

[blargness]

I did it at even level (31 or 32ish?) and interrupted something (maybe thundering blast? or was that the later fellow?) and in between jolt cooldowns I'd use my knockback or low slash. Right as Khem was running low on health I popped my 20 minute cooldown for a second electrocute.

 

If things started looking bad I'd low slash and line of site and pop a medpack.

 

I'm pretty sure Khem died at some point but so did Zash.

 

It's been a few weeks but I know its certainly possible to solo Zash as an even level deception build.

 

edit:

To the guy above me, agree strongly. I actually end up burning my commendations for a planet on companion gear. Also don't forget they generally don't come with an earpiece, implants and a helm.

Edited January 25, 2012 by blargness

[JCDIP]

It took me about 7 fights to take down Zash, each time I both died and had to repair my gear or I forced cloak out to fight another day.

 

I ended up trying to first fight her at lvl 31 but had no luck. So I lvled up to 32 and gave it another shot, thinking my hp would be a bit higher to help me out.

*** Heads up Lord Zash will be at whatever lvl you are. IE: your lvl 32, she is lvl 32.

And for me I was required to take Val into the instance, I didn't have a choice to take any of my other companions.

 

 

So to open up the fight I cloaked hit her with a daze and then I popped all my buffs while she was dazed.

Right before I made my first strike I hit her with a spell (can’t remember the name) and then Mauled her.

From there I tried to interrupt all her cast but the one that got through was one that dazed Val.

When my health got down to about half I popped a med with heal over time.

When Zash's health was about 1/4 left Val ended up dying and I started giving her everything I had.

 

When I defeated her I think I had about 300hps left.

Edited January 25, 2012 by JCDIP

[sanctimonia]

Reason?

 

No Heals

 

AT ALL.

 

Our spec revolves around surging charge and as such we cant really use dark unless we want to gimp our DPS.

 

Dark Charge is our Bear from.

 

You see....other classes like say...merc.

 

They have a heal spec but even if they dont spec for it they still get 2 heals to use in case of emergencies or to keep their tank pet up in gold mob fights.

 

Now take say Juggs

 

They have a tank spec...but even if they dont spec it they still wear heavy armor and have saber ward and a few other tank CDs.

 

Now take Sins

 

The ONLY way we can take effectivly is with Dark Charge....which boosts our armor and def to tank levels and gives us a nice little heal proc.

 

But again..doing that negates the whole point of deception in the first place...since we lose surging discharge and proc.

 

Thus we dont have the 1-2 tank goodies the other DPS classes have to make life eaiser or the 1-2 heal goodies like Sorcs.

 

 

Thus we have a Tank companion that we CANT heal or help in anyway (I swear khem is bugged or something as well...since he goes down WAAAAY too fast) or a heal companion in which case we cant get behind our targets to Maul.

 

So yea...its a lose lose but I still leveled 1-50 as deception out of spite

Edited January 25, 2012 by sanctimonia

[Runieux]

At first I kind of liked the close calls, narrowly defeating a tough boss or having to try a few times over to do what felt like a really challenging battle.

 

As I'm approaching 50 I feel like I can barely do my class quests solo and it's just getting frustrating. I feel like I have to play a game of threat tag with my companion in order to win most fights that are at my level.

[Omite]

I had no problem levelling at all. Routinely did quests 1-2 levels above me and had no issues. I think you need to re vistit the part where you learn when and how to use all your abilities.

 

edit: I'm not sure why you think that a stealth class using stealth to break aggro and heal up is an issue.

Edited January 25, 2012 by Omite

[Bahamude]

At first I kind of liked the close calls, narrowly defeating a tough boss or having to try a few times over to do what felt like a really challenging battle.

 

As I'm approaching 50 I feel like I can barely do my class quests solo and it's just getting frustrating. I feel like I have to play a game of threat tag with my companion in order to win most fights that are at my level.

 

After I got Talos, I never died again unless I was experimenting or learning my other companions. Use him for all boss fights. Gear him up (and your other companions) and gear yourself up. Keep aggro off of him and you'll never die. He will keep you up no matter what if you just keep him focused on healing you.

[Bahamude]

It took me about 7 fights to take down Zash, each time I both died and had to repair my gear or I forced cloak out to fight another day.

 

I ended up trying to first fight her at lvl 31 but had no luck. So I lvled up to 32 and gave it another shot, thinking my hp would be a bit higher to help me out.

*** Heads up Lord Zash will be at whatever lvl you are. IE: your lvl 32, she is lvl 32.

And for me I was required to take Val into the instance, I didn't have a choice to take any of my other companions.

 

 

So to open up the fight I cloaked hit her with a daze and then I popped all my buffs while she was dazed.

Right before I made my first strike I hit her with a spell (can’t remember the name) and then Mauled her.

From there I tried to interrupt all her cast but the one that got through was one that dazed Val.

When my health got down to about half I popped a med with heal over time.

When Zash's health was about 1/4 left Val ended up dying and I started giving her everything I had.

 

When I defeated her I think I had about 300hps left.

 

When I fought Zash, she didn't match level with me so I don't know if this was a change that happened recently. I was 3 levels above Zash when I finally beat her, and I had about 200 hps left.

 

I tried fighting her at 2 lvls above and couldn't pull it off. But I admit, my Khem had only default quest gear which meant he wouldn't last as long as he could. Lesson learned.

[LordbishopX]

When I fought Zash, she didn't match level with me so I don't know if this was a change that happened recently. I was 3 levels above Zash when I finally beat her, and I had about 200 hps left.

 

I tried fighting her at 2 lvls above and couldn't pull it off. But I admit, my Khem had only default quest gear which meant he wouldn't last as long as he could. Lesson learned.

 

 

Wow that bad I did zash pretty easy as full deception build the key was interrupt and have khem and yourself both go full tank in my case as full deception I carried a shield and used Dark charge mode. It's basic you can't dps if your dead in big fights you need the extra D vs the O cause the damage incoming is greater than what many can generate. You will have to run around when u see the ground light up its a sign that says move ur butt. Also blowing channel the force correctly and its not when your almost dead but rather at the 65-75% and basically get your force up and electrocute then maul maul hit channel the force electrocute and maul maul you get to dump a ton of damage and she can't do anything. The above works for most things.

 

Oh and its Low slash/electrocute/shock -> Maul I always get my mauls in lol. Yeah Dark charge mode gimps damage but at times some fights living is by far easier and safer using it vs a dps race.

Edited January 25, 2012 by LordbishopX