wishihadaname Posted July 21, 2012 Share Posted July 21, 2012 Its not exactly a new idea, evolution had come up with it milliions of years before we even walked the planet. When a prey species is threatened by a superior predator, it sometimes changes over time to look toxic or dangerous. That is exactly what I have attempted to do by equipping my Gunny mando with a rifle. Vanguards, in all 3 of their specs, are a force to be feared and are never anyones first target. Commandoes however are often the first ones leaped at by a lolrauder or operative out for ganks. Armor wise, we already look like vanguards, with only one major giveaway to the fact that we are not in fact tanks. The biggest, loudest and most glaring difference between commandoes and vanguards is our cannons, and although we do lose Charged Bolts and Hail of bolts as well as damage on HiB and full auto by equipping a rifle, its not actually all that much. Charged Bolts and Hail of Bolts aren't used much in gunny spec, and the 15% damage loss on FA and HiB is offset by the fact that you will be able to fire more grav rounds due to being focused less. Also we lose no damage on demo round, sticky nade, grav round, explosive round, and pyro nade as all of those are based off of tech power and not weapon damage. Couple of other pointers for surviving in Gunny or Combat medic spec:1) NEVER. EVER. EVER. use hammer shot as a CM, its a giant green beam of death that points directly to you. No amount of disguise is going to save you from that sort of obvious demarkation. Once somebody figures out who is healing, they will mark you, and then your vanguard disguise is useless. Charge up your cell by auto attacking enemies and cast healing friendies. Also avoid using the goop nade as that one is rather visible too. 2) Positioning is everything. Having that vanguard disguise should throw the enemy off just long enough to set up at a good spot. A good spot is somewhere where you can punt the enemy further than they can leap/shoot. So the platforms on huttball, near the pit or on a crate on voidstar, on top of a hill near some LoS object (in case of snipers) in Novare, ect. 3) Hotkey stealth scan to your mouse. I have mine set to the right mouse button, so I can drop it as soon as my enemy vanishes. If you set up right, you can put it between your enemy and you so you will have 10 seconds to cast heals and be ready to get opened on again while your enemy cannot close from fear of having their from stealth burst broken. 4) Learn to love the mando punt. In gunny spec this is your best defense against all melee, and on every map but Alderaan there are serveral spots you can set up in where you can punt the enemy 40+ meters (if they are on top of the hill and you are a meter or two below them). Disclaimers: Using a rifle won't fool people who already know you by name, it won't work for assault since they need to use CB often, you will take about a 5% hit to DPS in total (according to my parsing using the same mods in a rifle shell), its not fool proof, it won't make you a better mando if the only thing you know how to do is spam grav rounds. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Easpeak Posted July 22, 2012 Share Posted July 22, 2012 (edited) To me Vanguards/Powertechs are as big of a target as healers - only PTs I'd skip are the ones running Ion Cell (tanks). Any decent player will check the cell you are using and he/she will mark you anyway, unless you are planning on running a different cell and being a healer. Edited July 22, 2012 by Easpeak Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grogget Posted July 22, 2012 Share Posted July 22, 2012 (edited) Wall of text aside - here's one MAJOR flaw with your idea: people who have the class icon enabled. I've had that feature turned on since it was implemented, and I can tell peoples classes at a glance. A vanguards icon is a green Y shape, while a commandos looks like a green bullet shape with some kind of sparkle around it. Conversely, a Mercenary has that weird green shape I think looks like an ironfist or some kind of aircraft while a Powertech has a green flame icon. So regardless if you're using an assault cannon or a blaster rifle, I and others could still pick you out from the crowd. I realize not everyone likes playing with the class icons above their heads, but to me I find it very useful. http://www.forcejunkies.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/advanced_icons.jpg (A bit off topic here: why is the color coding for Jedi Sages and Sith Assassins light blue while Jedi Shadow and Sith Sorcerers are dark blue? Shouldn't Assassin/Shadow have a dark blue icon while Sage/Sorc have a light blue one?) Edited July 22, 2012 by Grogget Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wishihadaname Posted July 22, 2012 Author Share Posted July 22, 2012 Ahh right, I forgot about the icons since I turned them off. Checking what cell you're running requires someone to actually target you and know the icons for each of the trooper cells. Alot of people won't do this when looking for a target, especially if there are alot of targets at once like at the begining of a match. But the class icon would blow my disguise rather readily. So far i've had marked sucess running with a blaster, usually I was leaped at as soon as I was seen. Now i'm usually ignored until I start shooting grav rounds (by which point I am in position). So maybe i've just been lucky so far but it seems to be working. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Easpeak Posted July 23, 2012 Share Posted July 23, 2012 (edited) Ahh right, I forgot about the icons since I turned them off. Checking what cell you're running requires someone to actually target you and know the icons for each of the trooper cells. Alot of people won't do this when looking for a target, especially if there are alot of targets at once like at the begining of a match. But the class icon would blow my disguise rather readily. So far i've had marked sucess running with a blaster, usually I was leaped at as soon as I was seen. Now i'm usually ignored until I start shooting grav rounds (by which point I am in position). So maybe i've just been lucky so far but it seems to be working. No doubt the stuff will work to a degree in PUGs, but I don't check the "class" icons I just know the cells and cylinders - because even if I see a Vanguard I want to know if it's Assault spec which is going to hurt (and is easy to burn down) or if it's Shield Spec, won't hurt but good ones can lock we down and they can take a beating before dying. EDIT: I wanted to do the same thing because the big gun just looks ridiculous on healer - but opted not to because I will lose more than I win. Edited July 23, 2012 by Easpeak Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soljin Posted July 30, 2012 Share Posted July 30, 2012 Its not exactly a new idea, evolution had come up with it milliions of years before we even walked the planet. When a prey species is threatened by a superior predator, it sometimes changes over time to look toxic or dangerous. That is exactly what I have attempted to do by equipping my Gunny mando with a rifle. Vanguards, in all 3 of their specs, are a force to be feared and are never anyones first target. Commandoes however are often the first ones leaped at by a lolrauder or operative out for ganks. Armor wise, we already look like vanguards, with only one major giveaway to the fact that we are not in fact tanks. The biggest, loudest and most glaring difference between commandoes and vanguards is our cannons, and although we do lose Charged Bolts and Hail of bolts as well as damage on HiB and full auto by equipping a rifle, its not actually all that much. Charged Bolts and Hail of Bolts aren't used much in gunny spec, and the 15% damage loss on FA and HiB is offset by the fact that you will be able to fire more grav rounds due to being focused less. Also we lose no damage on demo round, sticky nade, grav round, explosive round, and pyro nade as all of those are based off of tech power and not weapon damage. Couple of other pointers for surviving in Gunny or Combat medic spec: 1) NEVER. EVER. EVER. use hammer shot as a CM, its a giant green beam of death that points directly to you. No amount of disguise is going to save you from that sort of obvious demarkation. Once somebody figures out who is healing, they will mark you, and then your vanguard disguise is useless. Charge up your cell by auto attacking enemies and cast healing friendies. Also avoid using the goop nade as that one is rather visible too. 2) Positioning is everything. Having that vanguard disguise should throw the enemy off just long enough to set up at a good spot. A good spot is somewhere where you can punt the enemy further than they can leap/shoot. So the platforms on huttball, near the pit or on a crate on voidstar, on top of a hill near some LoS object (in case of snipers) in Novare, ect. 3) Hotkey stealth scan to your mouse. I have mine set to the right mouse button, so I can drop it as soon as my enemy vanishes. If you set up right, you can put it between your enemy and you so you will have 10 seconds to cast heals and be ready to get opened on again while your enemy cannot close from fear of having their from stealth burst broken. 4) Learn to love the mando punt. In gunny spec this is your best defense against all melee, and on every map but Alderaan there are serveral spots you can set up in where you can punt the enemy 40+ meters (if they are on top of the hill and you are a meter or two below them). Disclaimers: Using a rifle won't fool people who already know you by name, it won't work for assault since they need to use CB often, you will take about a 5% hit to DPS in total (according to my parsing using the same mods in a rifle shell), its not fool proof, it won't make you a better mando if the only thing you know how to do is spam grav rounds. This makes me sad...We have resorted to pretending to be another AC to hide because we are such a known "Free kill"......I see Merc/Commandos on my Jugg and I think to myself...Hmm lets kill him real quick to get him out of the way....Its getting pretty bad for Merc/Commando DPS. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TUXs Posted July 30, 2012 Share Posted July 30, 2012 This makes me sad...We have resorted to pretending to be another AC to hide because we are such a known "Free kill"......I see Merc/Commandos on my Jugg and I think to myself...Hmm lets kill him real quick to get him out of the way....Its getting pretty bad for Merc/Commando DPS. No **edit**! If that doesn't say something about this broken class, I don't know what will. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SweetOldBob Posted July 30, 2012 Share Posted July 30, 2012 ...Commandoes however are often the first ones leaped at by a lolrauder or operative out for ganks. I always figured that I was getting jumped on for the same reason that I make a point to target all those force-lightening spewing mofos on the Imp side -- 'cause they (and we) do lots of conspicuous damage to the other team. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DCVAN Posted July 30, 2012 Share Posted July 30, 2012 I think they should make it to where hammershot doesn't shoot a green beam when wielding a rifle. I would then consider using one. I don't like healing with a cannon anyways. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xxIncubixx Posted July 30, 2012 Share Posted July 30, 2012 they should just give commandos and mercenaries all a chance to switch to vanguard subclass, the class is total garbage, easy kill to anyone... anyone that has 2 inches of a brain and interrupts and bum there goes the commando. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soljin Posted July 31, 2012 Share Posted July 31, 2012 (edited) they should just give commandos and mercenaries all a chance to switch to vanguard subclass, the class is total garbage, easy kill to anyone... anyone that has 2 inches of a brain and interrupts and bum there goes the commando. This had a full thread going in the BH/Merc forums....People were all ready to change AC's lol. I was ready to go...Play Pyro but be good at it! Edited July 31, 2012 by Soljin Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xxIncubixx Posted July 31, 2012 Share Posted July 31, 2012 This had a full thread going in the BH/Merc forums....People were all ready to change AC's lol. I was ready to go...Play Pyro but be good at it! pyro merc is fail compared to powertech pyro... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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