Assassin / Shadow [Deception / Infiltration] good for pvp 1.3

[Pibbe]

Hi!

 

So this is the case:

 

I started playing my assassin again (have not played him since March).

I use this build: http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#200McMZhGrRkhMbtzZc.2

 

now when i go in to a WZ i cant do ****! i get owned by everyone and my dmg sux!

I can no longer use adrenalins or trinkets for some extra busrt dmg.

 

 

Is there something wrong with my spec or summit?

Im VALOR RANK 63 atm. almost full BM gear.

 

 

I dont know what im doing wrong or is it just that we got hit HARD during last patches?

[Tau_Kunn]

you have one of the least survivable specs in game, given your abilities, so you have to subsidize that with smart play, ie: don’t rush in to the fray with the group thinking you’re gonna dish out damage like a marauder or Powertech, you will just get embarrassed a die fast. But if you go after the guys with 40-60% health, you should be dropping peeps before they can counter, 90%. Even still the results will be different if that’s a Jug with low health or a Merc, so understanding your target's abilities goes without question.

 

if your any good as a Dec Assassin, there's no reason you should be getting owned all the time. Not only do you need to master your rotation to perfection, but you need to top out your stats, get your gear, and understand the play style. You have way less survivability than most other DPS specs so don’t play like them. Deception is not for the newb looking for the easy entry spec into PvP, go darkness or Madness if that’s your Aim.

[SinnedWill]

So far I've been rocking with a 2 (for 6% armor penetration)/31 (I picked up 30% aoe damage reduction - which is HUGE - I also have the 30% armor bonus)/8 (up to chain-shock and I get the 2% damage mitigation). Yes, it's meant to be a squishy spec, but the DPS it puts out is INSANE - particularly when you combine the fact that we can stun-lock (so I completely understand the logic behind the squishiness). Unfortunately, my spec has issues with roots/slows (slows and partial survivability increase.

I haven't seen any other assassin spec be able to hit for over 5k consistantly like deception does - then again, we die much more often, so I suspect that's the reason.

Against good players, I'd say deception's worst warzone map is hutt-ball (though you can still stealth ahead for passes + quick goals via shroud + force speed) - but only if they don't have weapon-based roots to stop ya.

[SinnedWill]

you have one of the least survivable specs in game, given your abilities, so you have to subsidize that with smart play, ie: don’t rush in to the fray with the group thinking you’re gonna dish out damage like a marauder or Powertech, you will just get embarrassed a die fast. But if you go after the guys with 40-60% health, you should be dropping peeps before they can counter, 90%. Even still the results will be different if that’s a Jug with low health or a Merc, so understanding your target's abilities goes without question.

 

if your any good as a Dec Assassin, there's no reason you should be getting owned all the time. Not only do you need to master your rotation to perfection, but you need to top out your stats, get your gear, and understand the play style. You have way less survivability than most other DPS specs so don’t play like them. Deception is not for the newb looking for the easy entry spec into PvP, go darkness or Madness if that’s your Aim.

 

^^ Very true, but Deception can win 1v2's with proper execution. To me, Deception Assassin acts like a glorified concealment op, without the loss to sustained dps. It certainly requires heavy stealth-based tactics (mind traps and spike for opening) and then using force cloak to re-apply these stealth-based abilities if necessary (which, unfortunately, happens to be on a 2 min. cooldown). But it can certainly SHRED most classes without even needing to stun-lock them.

[Jorojus]

^^ Very true, but Deception can win 1v2's with proper execution. To me, Deception Assassin acts like a glorified concealment op, without the loss to sustained dps. It certainly requires heavy stealth-based tactics (mind traps and spike for opening) and then using force cloak to re-apply these stealth-based abilities if necessary (which, unfortunately, happens to be on a 2 min. cooldown). But it can certainly SHRED most classes without even needing to stun-lock them.

 

I am a bit confused, the OP states that he gets owned by everyone and you can win 1 vs 2

My assassin is only level 11 , I just got these nice abilities that I learned but I can only use them with a double bladed lightsaber wich I cant seem to find anywere at level 11

[Aehgo]

You have to play smart.You are the one who stalks the warzone for healers.If you see a healer without a guard you can get him down to 25% in your first few hits.

I frequently hit

Maul-5k

Shock-4.5k

Discharge-5k

Voltaic slash ussually hits for 1.2k each hit((Thats 4.8k damage for 2 hits)),combine this with overcharge saber which will hit for an extra few k during your opening..It wil really make healers worry.

[Nerth]

I am a bit confused, the OP states that he gets owned by everyone and you can win 1 vs 2

My assassin is only level 11 , I just got these nice abilities that I learned but I can only use them with a double bladed lightsaber wich I cant seem to find anywere at level 11

 

Your double-bladed lightsaber is in a bag you received when you've picked your advance class. Check your inventory, it's there.

[InariOkami]

^^ Very true, but Deception can win 1v2's with proper execution. To me, Deception Assassin acts like a glorified concealment op, without the loss to sustained dps. It certainly requires heavy stealth-based tactics (mind traps and spike for opening) and then using force cloak to re-apply these stealth-based abilities if necessary (which, unfortunately, happens to be on a 2 min. cooldown). But it can certainly SHRED most classes without even needing to stun-lock them.

 

Deception sustained DPS is a joke by the way. After you pop your reck->2xVS->Shock-> Discharge-> Maul, you literally run around like a chicken with your head off. And that's if you even get that rotation off without getting stunned and shut down completely. The reason the OP is getting stomped is because deception is so ridiculously easy to shut down. When you play at 2000 rating in ranked, any team that runs a deception assassin is going to be running 7v8. I know whenever I see a deception assassin on one of my healers I wait for him to twirl his lightsaber twice, then stun him and taunt him whenever he gets out of his stun and spike in between shock and discharge. And this is all without guard. Oh, you wanted to kill my healer? Sorry. Deception is a broken spec and needs buffs as badly as concealment ops do. Being a glorified one trick pony doesn't make you any asset to your team.

Edited July 2, 2012 by InariOkami

[SinnedWill]

Deception sustained DPS is a joke by the way. After you pop your reck->2xVS->Shock-> Discharge-> Maul, you literally run around like a chicken with your head off. And that's if you even get that rotation off without getting stunned and shut down completely. The reason the OP is getting stomped is because deception is so ridiculously easy to shut down. When you play at 2000 rating in ranked, any team that runs a deception assassin is going to be running 7v8. I know whenever I see a deception assassin on one of my healers I wait for him to twirl his lightsaber twice, then stun him and taunt him whenever he gets out of his stun and spike in between shock and discharge. And this is all without guard. Oh, you wanted to kill my healer? Sorry. Deception is a broken spec and needs buffs as badly as concealment ops do. Being a glorified one trick pony doesn't make you any asset to your team.

 

What I meant by them having great sustained dps is that they can pop blackout (without being stealthed) to maintain their force (assuming they aren't dead after killing their first target) - and I'm sorry to see that the deception assassins you've been facing don't know how to stunlock or pop shroud.

[dronepilot]

What I meant by them having great sustained dps is that they can pop blackout (without being stealthed) to maintain their force (assuming they aren't dead after killing their first target) - and I'm sorry to see that the deception assassins you've been facing don't know how to stunlock or pop shroud.

 

actually this ^^

 

This guy is spot on.

[richardya]

actually this ^^

 

This guy is spot on.

 

Blackout gives you an additional 10 force every 60 seconds. You also have an additional 10 in your force pool from another infiltration AC ability.

That does not come close to competing with the KC 30% regeneration increase, and they have a talent to lower the cost of project/Saber strike.

 

If you are continually DPS'ing you will run out of force. Fast.

 

The people who say it is easy to shut down an infiltration spec are exaggerating. They assume that the target has his stun up, that the shadow does not have his breaker and that they knew the big rotation was coming. You can twirl 2x on target A and unload on target B. The spec should also not be targeting someone alone anyway.

 

(Also, low slash is better then the talented spinning kick.)

 

There are team makeups where this spec as well as concealment op are very good.

In huttball it is a viable ball carrier in many situations, it has resilience, deflection and force speed and can get open with stealth. If he needs to, he also has a level 1 ability called pass.

 

Comparing it to KC, the tanking spec, it is worse, that is simply because the tank spec does great DPS for a tank, which is another issue.

 

The spec is fun, not as good as tank spec, it is useful, but I think it's resource management needs help.

Edited July 2, 2012 by richardya

[ShatteredVision]

Your spec is messed up. http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#2000MZhGbRkhrbtzZf0c.2

[Pibbe]

Your spec is messed up. http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#2000MZhGbRkhrbtzZf0c.2

 

if i use this specc i will lose the mobility from "Lightning recovery" in the darkness tree.

Aint that skill worth kind of alot when runing from node to node?

 

Well i will try the build you linked.

But i kinda feel like some ppl have stated that the force i running low rly quick and after you have opened and "IF" the target is still alive i kinda cant do **** :S

[SinnedWill]

Blackout gives you an additional 10 force every 60 seconds. You also have an additional 10 in your force pool from another infiltration AC ability.

That does not come close to competing with the KC 30% regeneration increase, and they have a talent to lower the cost of project/Saber strike.

 

If you are continually DPS'ing you will run out of force. Fast.

 

The people who say it is easy to shut down an infiltration spec are exaggerating. They assume that the target has his stun up, that the shadow does not have his breaker and that they knew the big rotation was coming. You can twirl 2x on target A and unload on target B. The spec should also not be targeting someone alone anyway.

 

(Also, low slash is better then the talented spinning kick.)

 

There are team makeups where this spec as well as concealment op are very good.

In huttball it is a viable ball carrier in many situations, it has resilience, deflection and force speed and can get open with stealth. If he needs to, he also has a level 1 ability called pass.

 

Comparing it to KC, the tanking spec, it is worse, that is simply because the tank spec does great DPS for a tank, which is another issue.

 

The spec is fun, not as good as tank spec, it is useful, but I think it's resource management needs help.

 

When talented blackout is used outside of stealth it gives and instant +10 force + 50% force regen for 6s - that's a total of 82 force over 4 GCD - you would normaly only gain 48 force over that time. You can also talent blackout's cooldown down to 45s (same talent that reduces force cloak cooldown from 3 min. to 2 min.). Furthermore, you gain 10 force back every time your surging charge procs (occurs once every 10s). If you have survived long enough to come out of cloak, kill one person, pop blackout, kill another person, yes you WILL start to have force maintainance issues if you don't have an opportunity to re-stealth - but... then you can always just pop force cloak, wait a few seconds, then immediatly resume attacking, since you'll retain the 50% force regen for 6s. And lets not forget that we pretty much only use shock following 2x Voltaic Slash (for both the damage bonus and the 50% shock force cost reduction) and we only use maul with maul procs (for the armor penetration and the 50% force cost reduction).

 

Only times I ever really have force maintainance issues are when I'm fighting someone that throws DoT's, slows, knockbacks, mezzes and roots on me and kites after I've already rocked his teammate (while my shroud, blackout and force cloak are on cooldown).

 

Slows, knockbacks, DoT's, mezzes and roots are the bane of any deception assassin.

 

As tankassin I would roll as 31/2/8 (the 2 points in deception were for maul proccs), so even with the passive 30% force regen, I run out of force as tankassin with a quickness since I don't have the force cost reduction for shock, wither costs 30 force, thrash spamming is required for the energized shock procs (again, I didn't talent its cost down, so 25 each, and sometimes you need to thrash more than 2 times to get an energized shock proc) and procced mauls are 25 force. Pretty much the only time I could use an ability and regenerate more force for its duration than it cost to use is force lightning (which, of course, we only use with 3 stacks of Harnessed Darkness). Sure, the +2 force each time I'd dodge or shield helps, but the only time this is really effective is when you use deflection, which is a long cooldown.

 

Now, I DO agree that tankassins were nerfed in the wrong manner - it's their DPS potential that puts them far ahead of all other tank specced classes, though their survivability was also much too high - in all honesty, they should've nerfed its damage and some of its utility (which still makes up the majority of its survivability) - hell, they should've thrown the slow/root break attached to force speed over to the deception tree, IMO.

[SinnedWill]

Your spec is messed up. http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#2000MZhGbRkhrbtzZf0c.2

 

I use a different 2/31/8 spec than you do, personally, though our darkness/madness tree builds are identical. Personally, I don't use the jolt cooldown talent at all (warriors/powertechs have a base 8s CD on interrupt which is better than our talented 10s CD - and although the 30s stun-break CD is nice, it doesn't seem to save me as much as where my other points are), I don't bother with the +10 max force, and I only have 1 point in the force slow cooldown/duration talent. In place of what you're using, I run with the discharge cooldown reduction and the 30% aoe damage reduction.

Discharge is our heaviest hitter (if not our heaviest overall) against heavy armored enemies and I can't even begin to describe how effective the AoE damage reduction talent is - it's actually impressive in lv. 50 warzones due to how it reduces damage before expertise factors in (I'd say it's closer to 40 or 50% when opponents are in full WH gear) - takes ~5 empowered smash-crits from a smash jugg to drop me - without it, I'd usually be dead on the 2nd one.

[richardya]

When talented blackout is used outside of stealth it gives and instant +10 force + 50% force regen for 6s - that's a total of 82 force over 4 GCD - you would normaly only gain 48 force over that time. You can also talent blackout's cooldown down to 45s (same talent that reduces force cloak cooldown from 3 min. to 2 min.). Furthermore, you gain 10 force back every time your surging charge procs (occurs once every 10s). If you have survived long enough to come out of cloak, kill one person, pop blackout, kill another person, yes you WILL start to have force maintainance issues if you don't have an opportunity to re-stealth - but... then you can always just pop force cloak,.

 

Just to recap my point was that the spec has resource issues if played correctly.

 

1) The out-of-stealth regen ability is the first tier of infiltration/deception so it's available to the tank spec whereas the 30% regen is in the 4th tier of the tank spec which is unavailable to infiltration/deception. So, the tank spec which is far from underpowered gets a big advantage here.

 

2) The playstyle of using of cloak/shroud works to get out of combat to get the regen buff works. But the ability is supposed to be your escape ability, not a way to get force back through the buff. You are also giving away the escape ability that is supposed to help survivability of the spec. That is not really fair.

Edited July 2, 2012 by richardya

[SinnedWill]

if i use this specc i will lose the mobility from "Lightning recovery" in the darkness tree.

Aint that skill worth kind of alot when runing from node to node?

 

Well i will try the build you linked.

But i kinda feel like some ppl have stated that the force i running low rly quick and after you have opened and "IF" the target is still alive i kinda cant do **** :S

 

You'll pick up chain-shock (which, if it proccs, will cause youre shocks to deal an extra attack at 50% damage, which is HUGE). Yes, you'll lose some overall mobility and you can't use shroud quite as often, but you should really rely on stealth not only for the mana regen rate bonuses, but also for being patient enough to pick/choose your fights effectively. Also, since force speed doesn't break roots/slows like it does for tankassin, it's somewhat less useful, so you'll get by.

[SinnedWill]

Just to recap my point was that the spec has resource issues if played correctly.

 

1) The out-of-stealth regen ability is the first tier of infiltration/deception so it's available to the tank spec whereas the 30% regen is in the 4th tier of the tank spec which is unavailable to infiltration/deception. So, the tank spec which is far from underpowered gets a big advantage here.

 

2) Your use of cloak/shroud is needed but the ability is supposed to be your escape ability, not a way to get force back through the buff. You are correct that it works but you are also giving up the escape ability that is supposed to help survivability. That is not really fair.

 

I usually combat-cloak when reinforcements appear or so that I can mind-trap again - I suppose I use it more tactically for offensive/cc capability compared to the typical "gunned, now time to run!" tactics.

 

Also, tank-specs can't talent into making blackout be usable outside of stealth for its force maintainance purposes, though you are right, the stealthed force regen bonus talent is AVAILABLE to tankassins to pick-up (though I've never heard of a good tankassin spec that has it).

Edited July 2, 2012 by SinnedWill

[richardya]

I usually combat-cloak when reinforcements appear or so that I can mind-trap again - I suppose I use it more tactically for offensive/cc capability compared to the typical "gunned, now time to run!" tactics.

 

Mind trap will only work if your opponent is not in combat with any dots or other players on him, so I rarely use it that way except in a 1v1. Cloak has too many uses to list but suffice to say, I don't want the escape ability to be burned, whenever its up, in order to get more force, that is not how the spec is designed.

 

Also, tank-specs can't talent into making blackout be usable outside of stealth for its force maintainance purposes, though you are right, it's AVAILABLE to tankassins to pick-up (though I've never heard of a good tankassin spec that has it).

 

That is 100% true and my point, because the tank spec has no force issues to go along with it's other advantages. 30% regeneration is huge, and I think spinning kick vs low slash is a force cost saver as well.

 

Devs, throw the infiltration spec a bone, it's literally laughed at. mostly because the other tree is so good but still.

TLDR: Emergency patch please

Edited July 2, 2012 by richardya

[ShatteredVision]

You'll pick up chain-shock (which, if it proccs, will cause youre shocks to deal an extra attack at 50% damage, which is HUGE). Yes, you'll lose some overall mobility and you can't use shroud quite as often, but you should really rely on stealth not only for the mana regen rate bonuses, but also for being patient enough to pick/choose your fights effectively. Also, since force speed doesn't break roots/slows like it does for tankassin, it's somewhat less useful, so you'll get by.

 

An infiltration/deception spec played properly will have no problems whatsoever with staying on their target. If you're talking combat mobility, it's a complete non-issue for us, especially with talented force slow. We have great single target control. Force slow should be used liberally. Keep in mind, you don't have to be close to use it. Especially, with our pvp set bonus. And, as noted, the talented shock hits like a truck. WELL worth it.

[ShatteredVision]

I use a different 2/31/8 spec than you do, personally, though our darkness/madness tree builds are identical. Personally, I don't use the jolt cooldown talent at all (warriors/powertechs have a base 8s CD on interrupt which is better than our talented 10s CD - and although the 30s stun-break CD is nice, it doesn't seem to save me as much as where my other points are), I don't bother with the +10 max force, and I only have 1 point in the force slow cooldown/duration talent. In place of what you're using, I run with the discharge cooldown reduction and the 30% aoe damage reduction.

Discharge is our heaviest hitter (if not our heaviest overall) against heavy armored enemies and I can't even begin to describe how effective the AoE damage reduction talent is - it's actually impressive in lv. 50 warzones due to how it reduces damage before expertise factors in (I'd say it's closer to 40 or 50% when opponents are in full WH gear) - takes ~5 empowered smash-crits from a smash jugg to drop me - without it, I'd usually be dead on the 2nd one.

 

I actually have used the discharge cooldown speced, but for my playstyle it came down to that or the force slow talent, and the force slow fit me better. I've considered giving the aoe talent a go, but haven't yet. I've heard it talked about in other classes, too...I think sentinels can spec -30% , too. One of the keys to good deception is to always be moving, so I haven't had much trouble in the way of AoE. The only time I really have issues is trying to defuse a bomb in voidstar, if I didn't sneak up to it. It kind of puts things in perspective when you meet near-instant aoe death from multiple enemies. haha.

[DarkDruidSS]

Sinnedwill, Is this the build you are talking about running?

 

http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#2000MZRGbRkGMbtzZf0c.2

 

I haven't played my sin in a long time. I might try out this build and see how it goes, but I still think voltiac slash is going to lead me to respawning over and over.

[Jedikillar]

well, my sin is only 24, but she does great in pvp so far. obviously yes its 1-49 pvp where there are a bunch of noobs to the game, but not all are, and i can easily 1v1 or even 1v2 people much higher level than me, and i feel very satisfied with the damage and survivability so far. pretty squishy if targeted, but thats why you try to target people low on health so you can get in, stealth out, and be safe and have your regen buff up when you head in again.