Hate grav/tracer spam? You are the 99%

[MartyrLXXVII]

Pretty much this. I find it difficult to imagine what was going through the head of the guy who designed this class. It reminds me of playing a chosen in warhammer (with nerfbuttons and twister) where 85% of my game play was mashing the same button over and over again.

 

Strangely enough I played like that for a while. I guess winning is it own kind of fun.

 

Oh yeah.. lets change a class because a few people think it's a boring mechanic. Ignoring the fact some people like it, its good for newbs to get their game on, and it's not unbalanced.

 

Well if that's the case, I like my Powertech, But its missing some things that would make it more fun, like force choke and the like. So its ok to make changes based on individual enjoyment, so lets make these changes too.

 

You have no idea how stupid that all sounds from a design stand point.

[Derian]

Interrupt.

[Morticoccus]

Interrupt.

 

GM: You flawlessly interrupt the tracer missile cast, the mercenary stands in front of you, utterly shocked. As you move to end his life you hear the crackle of force lightning an instant before the attack hits, searing pain surges through you as your nervous system is instantly overloaded, flooding your brain with discordant signals.

 

Your move speed is now 50% of standard while the merc regains his wits and knocks you away, you are now focused by two players that can keep you snared until you die. GG

[dschlan]

I am the 1% that can find his interrupt key.

[Morticoccus]

I am the 1% that can find his interrupt key.

 

I have three interrupt keys, but I am in the X% that can't find a common strategy.

[Astarica]

When people say interrupt I think they really mean 'hope the other guy is stupid'.

 

Assuming 31 in Arsenal, interrupt only matters to a Merc if Railshot, HSM, Unload, Healing Scan, Jet Boost (if against melee), and sometimes Rocket Punch are all down.

 

Now Railshot/HSM is likely to be used as soon as possible since they're literally no brainer abilities, but it still leaves you 3 skills. If Unload is up, then interrupt accomplishes basically nothing because Unload lasts 3 seconds and is a decent filler attack.

 

If Healing Scan is up it basically uses one of the merc's GCD to cancel one of your GCDs, except the Merc generally has more powerful other abilities on CD so stalling time is good for him.

 

Jet Boost is kind of a weird case since it should be always used against melee, so technically they don't use it to react to your interrupt. That said, each Jet Boost usually sets the melee back far more than the interruption duration, so this is a losing fight too unless you're a class with strong anti-KB mechanics (Assassins, for example).

 

Finally if you're in Huttball, Rocket Punch is actually quite deadly since it will always knock you off the catwalk and they can fine tune it to knock you into fire/acid, whereas Jet Boost usually tosses you too far for precision positioning.

 

Another commonly overlooked point is that if you interrupted nothing, the Merc will stop shooting at some point anyway because Tracers do pack a decent amount of heat. You pretty much use Unload to lose heat and Tracer to gain heat, so if you take away the Tracer option, they generally have to use Unload, and it's not hard for a merc to pile up more heat once Tracer is back up. You can always heal somebody if you found yourself with 0 heat, which happens quite often if your Tracers is constantly being interrupted. It's not super effective to heal as an Arsenal merc, but time is on your side is an extended fight since your long CD moves are generally more powerful than the enemy's, so the longer the fight goes, the more it's in your favor.

[dschlan]

When people say interrupt I think they really mean 'hope the other guy is stupid'.

 

Assuming 31 in Arsenal, interrupt only matters to a Merc if Railshot, HSM, Unload, Healing Scan, Jet Boost (if against melee), and sometimes Rocket Punch are all down.

 

Now Railshot/HSM is likely to be used as soon as possible since they're literally no brainer abilities, but it still leaves you 3 skills. If Unload is up, then interrupt accomplishes basically nothing because Unload lasts 3 seconds and is a decent filler attack.

 

If Healing Scan is up it basically uses one of the merc's GCD to cancel one of your GCDs, except the Merc generally has more powerful other abilities on CD so stalling time is good for him.

 

Jet Boost is kind of a weird case since it should be always used against melee, so technically they don't use it to react to your interrupt. That said, each Jet Boost usually sets the melee back far more than the interruption duration, so this is a losing fight too unless you're a class with strong anti-KB mechanics (Assassins, for example).

 

Finally if you're in Huttball, Rocket Punch is actually quite deadly since it will always knock you off the catwalk and they can fine tune it to knock you into fire/acid, whereas Jet Boost usually tosses you too far for precision positioning.

 

Another commonly overlooked point is that if you interrupted nothing, the Merc will stop shooting at some point anyway because Tracers do pack a decent amount of heat. You pretty much use Unload to lose heat and Tracer to gain heat, so if you take away the Tracer option, they generally have to use Unload, and it's not hard for a merc to pile up more heat once Tracer is back up. You can always heal somebody if you found yourself with 0 heat, which happens quite often if your Tracers is constantly being interrupted. It's not super effective to heal as an Arsenal merc, but time is on your side is an extended fight since your long CD moves are generally more powerful than the enemy's, so the longer the fight goes, the more it's in your favor.

 

And...you missed the whole point of the thread. It's about interrupting TM/Grav Round spammers. Nothing else.

[Morticoccus]

When people say interrupt I think they really mean 'hope the other guy is stupid'.

 

Assuming 31 in Arsenal, interrupt only matters to a Merc if Railshot, HSM, Unload, Healing Scan, Jet Boost (if against melee), and sometimes Rocket Punch are all down.

 

Now Railshot/HSM is likely to be used as soon as possible since they're literally no brainer abilities, but it still leaves you 3 skills. If Unload is up, then interrupt accomplishes basically nothing because Unload lasts 3 seconds and is a decent filler attack.

 

If Healing Scan is up it basically uses one of the merc's GCD to cancel one of your GCDs, except the Merc generally has more powerful other abilities on CD so stalling time is good for him.

 

Jet Boost is kind of a weird case since it should be always used against melee, so technically they don't use it to react to your interrupt. That said, each Jet Boost usually sets the melee back far more than the interruption duration, so this is a losing fight too unless you're a class with strong anti-KB mechanics (Assassins, for example).

 

Finally if you're in Huttball, Rocket Punch is actually quite deadly since it will always knock you off the catwalk and they can fine tune it to knock you into fire/acid, whereas Jet Boost usually tosses you too far for precision positioning.

 

Another commonly overlooked point is that if you interrupted nothing, the Merc will stop shooting at some point anyway because Tracers do pack a decent amount of heat. You pretty much use Unload to lose heat and Tracer to gain heat, so if you take away the Tracer option, they generally have to use Unload, and it's not hard for a merc to pile up more heat once Tracer is back up. You can always heal somebody if you found yourself with 0 heat, which happens quite often if your Tracers is constantly being interrupted. It's not super effective to heal as an Arsenal merc, but time is on your side is an extended fight since your long CD moves are generally more powerful than the enemy's, so the longer the fight goes, the more it's in your favor.

 

When I say "interrupt" I really mean: "Hope that the other guy doesn't have friends in range"

 

Which, it seems, he almost always has.

[angryca]

Oh yeah.. lets change a class because a few people think it's a boring mechanic. Ignoring the fact some people like it, its good for newbs to get their game on, and it's not unbalanced.

 

Well if that's the case, I like my Powertech, But its missing some things that would make it more fun, like force choke and the like. So its ok to make changes based on individual enjoyment, so lets make these changes too.

 

You have no idea how stupid that all sounds from a design stand point.

 

Do you find the gameplay to be compelling?

 

Do you find the class to be well designed mechanically?

 

What is your point?

 

You have no idea how stupid the spam is from a design stand point. I really want to know who brought this to the table.

[Arzoo]

The point of the interrupt is to stop him from putting the debuff on you. It doesn't matter if he has plenty of other attacks on varying cooldowns... they all pretty much suck if he can't cast grav round 2-3 times first. The overall dps loss to not getting 5 stacks of the debuff is easily 25%, if not more.

[Astarica]

The point of the interrupt is to stop him from putting the debuff on you. It doesn't matter if he has plenty of other attacks on varying cooldowns... they all pretty much suck if he can't cast grav round 2-3 times first. The overall dps loss to not getting 5 stacks of the debuff is easily 25%, if not more.

 

What kind of bad players do you go up against that can't get 2 missiles (4 stacks) in from range? Only Sorcs can interrupt from 30m. If you leap from range you get utterly owned by Jet Boost (since now you're snared and have no leap). If you walk from 30m to 4m, you'll eat at least 2 missiles if not 3. In Huttball I usually just drop 2 missiles on someone, and then tab to the next guy because it's far more helpful to my team is I drop 4 stacks of armor debuff on as many targets as possible as opposed to focusing on killing any one particular target. It takes 3 seconds to drop 2 missiles on any particular person. If you're so good that someone can't even get 3 seconds to cast, you should be hunting down healers. I'm sure you can kill them very well if they're never able to cast even 2 main heals in a row.

[drunknurse]

What is an interrupt anyway?

[Derian]

When people say interrupt I think they really mean 'hope the other guy is stupid'.

 

Assuming 31 in Arsenal, interrupt only matters to a Merc if Railshot, HSM, Unload, Healing Scan, Jet Boost (if against melee), and sometimes Rocket Punch are all down.

 

Now Railshot/HSM is likely to be used as soon as possible since they're literally no brainer abilities, but it still leaves you 3 skills. If Unload is up, then interrupt accomplishes basically nothing because Unload lasts 3 seconds and is a decent filler attack.

 

If Healing Scan is up it basically uses one of the merc's GCD to cancel one of your GCDs, except the Merc generally has more powerful other abilities on CD so stalling time is good for him.

 

Jet Boost is kind of a weird case since it should be always used against melee, so technically they don't use it to react to your interrupt. That said, each Jet Boost usually sets the melee back far more than the interruption duration, so this is a losing fight too unless you're a class with strong anti-KB mechanics (Assassins, for example).

 

Finally if you're in Huttball, Rocket Punch is actually quite deadly since it will always knock you off the catwalk and they can fine tune it to knock you into fire/acid, whereas Jet Boost usually tosses you too far for precision positioning.

 

Another commonly overlooked point is that if you interrupted nothing, the Merc will stop shooting at some point anyway because Tracers do pack a decent amount of heat. You pretty much use Unload to lose heat and Tracer to gain heat, so if you take away the Tracer option, they generally have to use Unload, and it's not hard for a merc to pile up more heat once Tracer is back up. You can always heal somebody if you found yourself with 0 heat, which happens quite often if your Tracers is constantly being interrupted. It's not super effective to heal as an Arsenal merc, but time is on your side is an extended fight since your long CD moves are generally more powerful than the enemy's, so the longer the fight goes, the more it's in your favor.

 

Most TM spammers are pretty stupid. Also interrupt isn't on the GCD.

[Derian]

GM: You flawlessly interrupt the tracer missile cast, the mercenary stands in front of you, utterly shocked. As you move to end his life you hear the crackle of force lightning an instant before the attack hits, searing pain surges through you as your nervous system is instantly overloaded, flooding your brain with discordant signals.

 

Your move speed is now 50% of standard while the merc regains his wits and knocks you away, you are now focused by two players that can keep you snared until you die. GG

 

I force camo and leave the lop sided situation.

[Morticoccus]

I force camo and leave the lop sided situation.

 

This is why I hate being level 21 =p

[Alonick]

Everyone has different experiences and look at things differently as far as whether we think something is OP or not.

 

How do I look at it? I can't go into a WZ without having two or three of these suckers spam it over and over again.

 

If it wasn't OP'd then no one would notice it and there wouldn't be any threads about it.

[Derian]

What kind of bad players do you go up against that can't get 2 missiles (4 stacks) in from range? Only Sorcs can interrupt from 30m. If you leap from range you get utterly owned by Jet Boost (since now you're snared and have no leap). If you walk from 30m to 4m, you'll eat at least 2 missiles if not 3. In Huttball I usually just drop 2 missiles on someone, and then tab to the next guy because it's far more helpful to my team is I drop 4 stacks of armor debuff on as many targets as possible as opposed to focusing on killing any one particular target. It takes 3 seconds to drop 2 missiles on any particular person. If you're so good that someone can't even get 3 seconds to cast, you should be hunting down healers. I'm sure you can kill them very well if they're never able to cast even 2 main heals in a row.

 

If I see any Grav round casters in vicinity, they are high pri to die. It goes healers>Glass cannons and they fall into the glass cannon category. (It's not hard to lock down TM Spam at all).

[Ozith]

When im healing and get a merc spamming their one button DPS rotation on me, I do this:

 

interrupt, wait till they cast it again,

stun, wait till they start casting again,

knockback, wait till they start casting again,

interrupt, run away.

 

Practice shutting their cast bar down, you'll be pleasantly surprised.

 

Edit: and don't fall for bait casts, know the spell by name.

Edited March 6, 2012 by Ozith
additions

[Morticoccus]

When im healing and get a merc spamming their one button DPS rotation on me, I do this:

 

interrupt, wait till they cast it again,

stun, wait till they start casting again,

knockback, wait till they start casting again,

interrupt, run away.

 

Practice shutting their cast bar down, you'll be pleasantly surprised.

 

Edit: and don't fall for bait casts, know the spell by name.

 

Or force leap for interrupt 1, preferably with overload active, zealous strike, cauterize, eat the knockback with rebuke up and then kick their ***.

[Ozith]

Or force leap for interrupt 1, preferably with overload active, zealous strike, cauterize, eat the knockback with rebuke up and then kick their ***.

 

sorc can't leap, sadly =)

[Morticoccus]

sorc can't leap, sadly =)

 

I just had an epiphany.

 

All of these players complaining about tracer missile spam, they are sages/sorcs that doesn't know how to interrupt, right?

[Greyfeld]

My main is a gunslinger. While I don't have much of an issue with spammers personally, I see them all the time in PVP and saw a lot of whining here on the forums. This post is just a reaction to having grav-spammed for a few pvps and seeing how awesomely effective it is with just 4 buttons.

 

When you're a sniper/GS, it's easy to get annoyed at how easy other classes have it.

[Ozith]

I just had an epiphany.

 

All of these players complaining about tracer missile spam, they are sages/sorcs that doesn't know how to interrupt, right?

 

Are they? *shrug* I just hear it a lot from sorcs...the whole light armor thing usually makes them QQ about ranged physical damage

[Greyfeld]

What kind of bad players do you go up against that can't get 2 missiles (4 stacks) in from range? Only Sorcs can interrupt from 30m. If you leap from range you get utterly owned by Jet Boost (since now you're snared and have no leap). If you walk from 30m to 4m, you'll eat at least 2 missiles if not 3. In Huttball I usually just drop 2 missiles on someone, and then tab to the next guy because it's far more helpful to my team is I drop 4 stacks of armor debuff on as many targets as possible as opposed to focusing on killing any one particular target. It takes 3 seconds to drop 2 missiles on any particular person. If you're so good that someone can't even get 3 seconds to cast, you should be hunting down healers. I'm sure you can kill them very well if they're never able to cast even 2 main heals in a row.

 

Sniper/GS can interrupt from 30m. But going 1v1 against a merc/commando is suicide if you're MM spec.

[Naizgrel]

Having problems with tracer missile ? Interrupt or just get out of BH LoS, not hard.