Deception Sin is Broken

[JahDux]

Title says it all. BW FIX PLOX, I don't wanna go tank to actually be able to dps. Makes no sense, right ?

[Pretty_Flacko]

Madness has more dps than deception with more survivability due to healing on DOTs and AOE attacks. My suggestion is try using force master glove+boot for the extra heals and use stalker for everything else..trust me it's lowkey OP

[Asphen]

No it is not.

 

In fact, a game developer took the time to tell people "Learn 2 play", because that is exactly what they need to do.

[cycao]

Not broken just useless. There is no real reason to put one on your ranked or end game PvE team. Other specs offer way more damage and utility and survivability.

[Asphen]

Not broken just useless. There is no real reason to put one on your ranked or end game PvE team. Other specs offer way more damage and utility and survivability.

 

All the deception assassins you know open with Voltaic Slash, never use Maul, and are always found at the node where the main fight is happening.

 

Here man, I'll help

 

How to be a Pro Deception Sin:

 

- Use Maul

- Take advantage of your 18 seconds of 50% force regeneration

- Attack lightly defended node

- Defend nodes and rock anyone that beebops over with burst

- Rock people traveling between nodes

- If you are at the node where the main fighting starts to happen, burst out until you die, then tell a defender to move to the main spot, and you replace him.

 

The developer even came out and told you people "Look guys, you're doing it wrong. Step back, and L2P" All they say back is "QQ, I want this awesome burst 100% of the time."

[Aaroneus]

All the deception assassins you know open with Voltaic Slash, never use Maul, and are always found at the node where the main fight is happening.

 

Here man, I'll help

 

How to be a Pro Deception Sin:

 

- Use Maul

- Take advantage of your 18 seconds of 50% force regeneration

- Attack lightly defended node

- Defend nodes and rock anyone that beebops over with burst

- Rock people traveling between nodes

- If you are at the node where the main fighting starts to happen, burst out until you die, then tell a defender to move to the main spot, and you replace him.

 

The developer even came out and told you people "Look guys, you're doing it wrong. Step back, and L2P" All they say back is "QQ, I want this awesome burst 100% of the time."

 

i'm going to roll an assassin to play on the side just out of sheer curiosity. i'll keep your pointers in mind. thanks

 

it can't be as bad as the OP is making it seem.

[cycao]

All the deception assassins you know open with Voltaic Slash, never use Maul, and are always found at the node where the main fight is happening.

 

Here man, I'll help

 

How to be a Pro Deception Sin:

 

- Use Maul

- Take advantage of your 18 seconds of 50% force regeneration

- Attack lightly defended node

- Defend nodes and rock anyone that beebops over with burst

- Rock people traveling between nodes

- If you are at the node where the main fighting starts to happen, burst out until you die, then tell a defender to move to the main spot, and you replace him.

 

The developer even came out and told you people "Look guys, you're doing it wrong. Step back, and L2P" All they say back is "QQ, I want this awesome burst 100% of the time."

 

Yeah I know how to play deception. Knowing how to play is not the point in the fact that madness and darkness offer better survivability better utility and better damage and both have self healing.

 

You cannot defend this fact that deception is the last resort in filling a spot for ranked warzones. Its fun to play but you will be more wanted with darkness or hybrid.

[SinnedWill]

Deception needs some extra mobility (i.e. force speed for tank spec on a 20s cooldown and breaks roots/slows) - sorry, shroud is used for me to remove DoT's and negate things like Thermal Detonator damage usually, and since we don't get the shroud duration bonus or the cooldown reduction (without sacrificing a lot), that's its main function. Other than that, deception is great (squishy as hell, which it should be since we have crazy DPS and an incredible stun-lock).

I just hit 50 on mine last night, and already topping damage charts despite being in recruit gear with WH weapon and BM legs (that's all I got up to before we began doing ranked matches, so I had to hop on my main). Been dishing out ~3500 shock crits (x1.5 if they chain-shock), ~3300 maul crits, ~3600 discharge crits (with 5 stacks), and 3800 assassinates to full WH geared enemies... albeit, I'm averaging ~8 deaths per match, since everyone outgears me and I'm taking huge damage.

Edited July 24, 2012 by SinnedWill

[AllanGand]

Well my assassin is still in the 30s but deception is amazing at bursting down people really quick, you simply can't sit there and expect to be a front line fighter, you have to be a sneaky bastard to be effective as deception.

[Gidoru]

Well my assassin is still in the 30s but deception is amazing at bursting down people really quick, you simply can't sit there and expect to be a front line fighter, you have to be a sneaky bastard to be effective as deception.

 

You can stop reading there. Honestly? You're making comments on game balance based on a sub 50 character? It amazes me that you think yourself qualified to even comment about Deception Assassins when you lack many of your skills, your opponents lack many of theirs and gear isnt a factor.

 

Deception isnt horrible but its also not great.

 

Heres a list of things that would likely improve it as far as im concerned.

 

1. Add to a high tier talent - Using Force Speed now removes rooting and slow effects.

2. Reduce the energy cost of Low Slash to 10-15 energy.

3. Add to a high tier talent - Reduces the cooldown of Recklessness by 30 seconds.

 

Basically these changes would give Deception some needed mobility.

Reducing the energy cost of Low Slash improves energy management and allows it be used more often

The reduction in Recklessness cooldown allows you get your burst off more often as when a Deception Assassins does not crit his damage is terrible

 

4. Crackling Blasts now a 3 point talent instead of 5 with same effect

5. Static Charges now a 1 point talent instead of 2 with same effect

6. Saber Conduit now a 2 point talent instead of 3 with same effect

 

These changes free up 4 talent points to put points into some utility skills, like the 30% aoe damage reduction, something you cant otherwise get in a competitive pvp build.

 

This i think would make Deception atleast up to par with most other classes/specs without doing anything too drastic.

Edited July 24, 2012 by Gidoru

[SinnedWill]

 

You can stop reading there. Honestly? You're making comments on game balance based on a sub 50 character? It amazes me that you think yourself qualified to even comment about Deception Assassins when you lack many of your skills, your opponents lack many of theirs and gear isnt a factor.

 

Deception isnt horrible but its also not great.

 

Heres a list of things that would likely improve it as far as im concerned.

 

1. Add to a high tier talent - Using Force Speed now removes rooting and slow effects.

2. Reduce the energy cost of Low Slash to 10-15 energy.

3. Add to a high tier talent - Reduces the cooldown of Recklessness by 30 seconds.

 

Basically these changes would give Deception some needed mobility.

Reducing the energy cost of Low Slash improves energy management and allows it be used more often

The reduction in Recklessness cooldown allows you get your burst off more often as when a Deception Assassins does not crit his damage is terrible

 

4. Crackling Blasts now a 3 point talent instead of 5 with same effect

5. Static Charges now a 1 point talent instead of 2 with same effect

6. Saber Conduit now a 2 point talent instead of 3 with same effect

 

These changes free up 4 talent points to put points into some utility skills, like the 30% aoe damage reduction, something you cant otherwise get in a competitive pvp build.

 

This i think would make Deception atleast up to par with most other classes/specs without doing anything too drastic.

 

Only thing I think deception needs is the mobility (root/slows breaking from force speed - albeit this talent is in the tank tree). Low slash is great as is and would be HORRIBLY overpowered if its force cost were reduced. Recklessness is fine as is, since any good deception assassin stacks a good bit of crit and uses the 4-piece bonus from stalker (which gives an extra stack of recklessness and reduces its cooldown) - I think deception would be putting out WAY too much damage if recklessness were on a shorter cooldown - and yes, although we don't do HUGE damage without crits, we DO dish out HUGE damage with crits - and we still do ~2k shock damage/2.5k discharge damage with non-crits, which is pretty good compared to other classes' non-crit damage values; but... I DO wish we could get something like a crit damage bonus from force slow.

[Boarg]

All the deception assassins you know open with Voltaic Slash, never use Maul, and are always found at the node where the main fight is happening.

 

Here man, I'll help

 

How to be a Pro Deception Sin:

 

- Use Maul

- Take advantage of your 18 seconds of 50% force regeneration

- Attack lightly defended node

- Defend nodes and rock anyone that beebops over with burst

- Rock people traveling between nodes

- If you are at the node where the main fighting starts to happen, burst out until you die, then tell a defender to move to the main spot, and you replace him.

 

The developer even came out and told you people "Look guys, you're doing it wrong. Step back, and L2P" All they say back is "QQ, I want this awesome burst 100% of the time."

 

I sure hope you mean "Use Maul but only with Exploit Weakness up" and not just regular Maul. Otherwise your pro-tip might as well be "flush 25 force down the toilet."

[Gidoru]

Only thing I think deception needs is the mobility (root/slows breaking from force speed - albeit this talent is in the tank tree). Low slash is great as is and would be HORRIBLY overpowered if its force cost were reduced. Recklessness is fine as is, since any good deception assassin stacks a good bit of crit and uses the 4-piece bonus from stalker (which gives an extra stack of recklessness and reduces its cooldown) - I think deception would be putting out WAY too much damage if recklessness were on a shorter cooldown - and yes, although we don't do HUGE damage without crits, we DO dish out HUGE damage with crits - and we still do ~2k shock damage/2.5k discharge damage with non-crits, which is pretty good compared to other classes' non-crit damage values; but... I DO wish we could get something like a crit damage bonus from force slow.

 

An ability that does moderate damage on 15 second cooldown and applies a CC that breaks on damage would be overpowered with a lower energy cost how?

 

The problem is if you do crit then you do probably more burst than most classes are capable of. If you dont crit you're doing quite a bit less damage than most classes are capable of. 2k non crits are cool, except for the fact that these abilities have cooldowns. If you can only do 4k damage in 2 globals with your biggest hitting attacks and not be able to do this combo again for 6+ seconds, well you're damage is not very good.

 

A rebalancing of Crackling Blasts to maybe 30% while adding extra crit chance via talents might fix this or otherwise lowering the cooldown on recklessness.

Either way Bioware wont do anything because they clearly dont know how to balance.

Edited July 24, 2012 by Gidoru

[SinnedWill]

An ability that does moderate damage on 15 second cooldown and applies a CC that breaks on damage would be overpowered with a lower energy cost how?.

Fills so little resolve to foes. The high energy cost is to help prevent us from abusing it. On that note, they DO need to address bubble-mez. Don't forget that if we let it run a full 4s, we regain 32 force (assuming we don't have dark embrace active), so it pays for itself.

The problem is if you do crit then you do probably more burst than most classes are capable of. If you dont crit you're doing quite a bit less damage than most classes are capable of. 2k non crits are cool, except for the fact that these abilities have cooldowns. If you can only do 4k damage in 2 globals with your biggest hitting attacks and not be able to do this combo again for 6+ seconds, well you're damage is not very good..

This is my point - the crit/non-crit aspect is how we're balanced out. If we get a crit out of stealth from spike (considered a force-based attack for some reason, since it gives me the melee crit chance proc from exploitive strikes) and use recklessness + overcharge saber, we're going to melt our target(s). Being able to do this more often would really kinda' overpower us.

[Gidoru]

Fills so little resolve to foes. The high energy cost is to help prevent us from abusing it. On that note, they DO need to address bubble-mez. Don't forget that if we let it run a full 4s, we regain 32 force (assuming we don't have dark embrace active), so it pays for itself.

Again how do you abuse something on a 15 second cooldown? You cant. with a Deception sins low survivability you'd be lucky to get to use it twice in a fight.

This is my point - the crit/non-crit aspect is how we're balanced out. If we get a crit out of stealth from spike (considered a force-based attack for some reason, since it gives me the melee crit chance proc from exploitive strikes) and use recklessness + overcharge saber, we're going to melt our target(s). Being able to do this more often would really kinda' overpower us.

 

This is why people complain about the spec. If you get crits you can drop someones health extremely quickly. But this assumes they arent using any kind of defensive cooldowns. For instance on a Marauder with cooldowns used your damage will not be great and if you've already blown recklessness well... you're not in a good position.

 

At the other end, when you dont crit your damage is pretty pathetic. The problem is even worse given the fact that your big damage dealers are on cooldowns. Meaning that if you fail to crit on multiple abilities you will probably be die before you kill the target.

It is quite a bit less than most consistent damage specs are capable of. Combined with overall low survivability, you can see the problem.

 

Thats why i suggested a rebalancing to make the damage more consistent.

Edited July 24, 2012 by Gidoru

[Asphen]

I sure hope you mean "Use Maul but only with Exploit Weakness up" and not just regular Maul. Otherwise your pro-tip might as well be "flush 25 force down the toilet."

 

You are one of those people the developer was talking about when he said "they don't get it, and hits a brick wall"

 

Why would you not open with Maul, or maybe Spike -> Maul? You have 50% force regen at this time. Don't think you are going to get stunned at least twice?

 

That extra mana regen will recover you while you are stunned.

 

Maul, and then Maul again with Exploit Weakness. It isn't about being force effecient, it is about getting them to less than 30% and cracking them with your finisher.

 

EDIT - Because I think you are challenged by math:

 

Force regen per second from stealth open: 12

Force regened for being stunned for four seconds: 48

Cost of Voltaic Slash: 30

Cost of Maul: 50 without Exploit Weakness

Force wasted and damage inflicted wasted by not opening with Maul: Lots

 

And maybe even gain more force back than the above while stunned, depending on your spec.

 

You are the dude opening with Voltaic Slash, failing at the class, and QQing about it.

Edited July 24, 2012 by Asphen

[SinnedWill]

You are one of those people the developer was talking about when he said "they don't get it, and hits a brick wall"

 

Why would you not open with Maul, or maybe Spike -> Maul? You have 50% force regen at this time. Don't think you are going to get stunned at least twice?

 

That extra mana regen will recover you while you are stunned.

 

Maul, and then Maul again with Exploit Weakness. It isn't about being force effecient, it is about getting them to less than 30% and cracking them with your finisher.

 

You are the dude opening with Voltaic Slash, failing at the class, and QQing about it.

 

I have no QQ about deception as far as its survivability/damage output go (though I do feel it needs the force speed cooldown reduction/root + slow -breaking attached to it from the tank spec more than the tanks do) and I don't open with a maul. Personally, the only time I'll even CONSIDER using a maul without a maul proc is if i have dark embrace + exploitive strikes melee crit bonus proc + full force + target is squishy and/or doesn't have defensive cooldowns up.

 

Seriously, using a maul without proc (at least) and/or crit chance bonus causes more resource issues in the long-run, and 2x voltaic slashes costs 50 force, so I find it vitally important to V-Slash with dark embrace (unless you're this crazy force-regen hybrid spec, then yes, you're a maul-monkey) and unless your target is a squishy without a bubble, you'll be missing out on a LOT of maul's potential damage. I usually prefer to hold on to a maul proc for 9-10s before using maul (this lets me get back-to-back procced mauls off). It's also difficult to catch moving targets (unless speed debuffed) with maul from stealth (even with the 15% movement speed boost talent - then again, some of this can be attributed to my assassin being body type 1 *facepalm* - not sure how well it works for others).

[Dissentus]

i'm going to roll an assassin to play on the side just out of sheer curiosity. i'll keep your pointers in mind. thanks

 

it can't be as bad as the OP is making it seem.

 

It's not; but it certainly isn't a cake walk compared to some other classes and takes good situational awareness and finesse because of how squishy you are.

[Skolops]

Wow... so many things to disagree with.

 

First, let it be said that I think deception is perfectly viable, albeit in need of a little buff.

 

Now, maul without the proc is just dumb, and if you're counting being stunned into your force spending, you're honestly just counting on performing sub-optimally. With all of the ccs in his belt, a deception assassin played well should have the opponent cced most of the fight and not be taking any himself. With low slash, spike, and the stun, I can take someone out and have him stunned long enough to be almost entirely unable to react.

 

Plus, if your opponent's stuns are not up and you open with maul, well, you're nit stunned but you have mo energy to do anything useful.

 

As to gearing, its the bad assassins whostack crit - or at least the ones who will perform sub optimally. Stacking power and surge will give you that giant burst. Stacking crit just gives you a more frequent wet paper towel burst. Shinarika stacks power, as do the other good shadows. Its really not even a question. If you're stacking crit, you're doing it wrong and gimping your burst.

[Boarg]

You are one of those people the developer was talking about when he said "they don't get it, and hits a brick wall"

 

Why would you not open with Maul, or maybe Spike -> Maul? You have 50% force regen at this time. Don't think you are going to get stunned at least twice?

 

That extra mana regen will recover you while you are stunned.

 

Maul, and then Maul again with Exploit Weakness. It isn't about being force effecient, it is about getting them to less than 30% and cracking them with your finisher.

 

EDIT - Because I think you are challenged by math:

 

Force regen per second from stealth open: 12

Force regened for being stunned for four seconds: 48

Cost of Voltaic Slash: 30

Cost of Maul: 50 without Exploit Weakness

Force wasted and damage inflicted wasted by not opening with Maul: Lots

 

And maybe even gain more force back than the above while stunned, depending on your spec.

 

You are the dude opening with Voltaic Slash, failing at the class, and QQing about it.

 

Wow...

 

I'm a primarily Infiltration player (Shadow version) and I'm extremely good at it and even have success in high end rated WZ's with it. I don't QQ about the spec, although I do admit that it's underpowered compared to the fotm stuff. I was just correcting your misinformation.

 

You clearly have no idea what you're talking about. Voltaic Slash costs 25 force, not 30. The class is force limited; that means your overall damage capability is limited to your damage per force of your abilities. Unless you're so bad that you let your force bar cap out, you need to use efficient attacks or else you gimp your damage. So, Maul costs 2x the force, but does it do 2x the damage? No, not even close. Voltaic slash also has several other advantages:

 

It boosts Shock damage and reduces Shock cost, so you actually have to compare 2x VS + Shock as a combo compared to Maul. (not even a contest)

It hits twice, so it's more likely to proc Surging Charge.

So it's also more likely to proc Saber Conduit for 10 force.

And also to build a stack of Static Charge.

It hits twice, so it's more likely to proc Exploit Weakness.

 

And regardless, I don't open with either one...normally, I would open with Spinning Kick -> Force Slow (2/2 Subduing Techniques.) It's more important to control and disrupt your target in most cases.

 

Using 50 force Mauls is bad, pure and simple. The spec has to manage force tight enough without throwing away extra for no good reason. It doesn't matter that you have increased regen for 6s because you're still going to use every bit of it later without capping out. Maul is terrific when used with Exploit Weakness procs, so just stick with that. Please don't spread misinformation while acting like an expert; it just makes the spec seem even worse for folks who believe you.

Edited July 24, 2012 by Boarg

[Monterone]

I've played a shadow since beta and an assassin on release, and I did very well as a deception sin on teams as well as 1v1.

 

I disagree with what some folks said about opening with Maul -- no way am I wasting that force in the beginning on something that's not only full force cost, but also has less chance to crit, since my spec also takes extra melee crit on force crit attack from Madness. And if it doesn't crit, there is no additional crit multiplier which makes it a weak and expensive opener -- a no no.

 

What I found worked well for me was to open up with Spike from stealth, and then toss in 2 Voltaic Slashes while they're getting up. If they stun you then, oh well, you get all that force back and have 2 stacks of VS up and possibly a few stacks of discharge already up. Pop Recklessness at this point and follow up with Shock (cheaper and more damage from procs) and Discharge. Those force crits now give you extra melee crit chance, so you find a way to get behind the target (Low Slash, stun or just walk behind them) and then Maul. At this point you should be able to get off an Assassinate (also with extra crit), and if that is not enough your Project/Shock is now up for the last charge of Recklessness.

 

Opening with Maul only wastes 50 force and if it does crit big (best case scenario), you then put them on defensive while you try to build up stacks you already should have had, while chasing them around.

Edited July 24, 2012 by Monterone

[Aehgo]

I do 500-600k regularly as darkness hybrid in optimised dps gear,I've never seen a Deception sin do over 400k.And the burst from deception doesn't seem much better then darkness hybrid((Recklessness-death field(3-4k),thrash till you get the shock proc(Hits 1.5k each hit and will proc withen 2 hits most times),procced shock+chainshock(5k+2.5k).

Throw in some maul procs aswell,with that kind of damage and pretty awesome survivabilty,why take low survivability,no AOE and rely on crits to do any major damage...

I was a deception assassin since I dinged 50,but after playing darkness hybrid for ranked games,theres no way I will touch deception..Some might be able to play it well,but they would probably do alot better in the darkness hybrid..

[upzie]

Fact is Deception is trash comparede to Darkness, its below madness aswell when we're talking rwz.

 

That said ofc. if you got a team, wich focus their tactics around a Deception Assasisns strength ofc you can make it work, but its really because you want to bring the player then, and not the class. Because every class/specc can do the job of a deception sin, just better, if you want pure dmg you bring a PT, Marauder og Rage Jugg, if you want Harass then you bring an Conc ops, he will do that job better aswell - on top of that they also bring more utility to the team than you do as Deception.

 

and for the ppl "omg omg omg its fun to play Deception", ye it is, and I enjoy it tons in normal wz's but in rwz it has no place unless you want to gimp your team.

 

And ye LOL and LOL (ss taken last night) dmg is possible in normal wz's, and it looks cool. But the utility is ****, and the dmg is mediocre vs good teams.

Edited July 24, 2012 by upzie

[Astarica]

I'm not sure who said this but winning is generally fun, and losing is generally not. At the end of the day mauling someone with a lightsaber is only fun if it actually kills them. The Sorcerer was definitely the coolest class in the game which can be confirmed by even a casual glance at initial WZ population distribution. I mean shooting purple lightning is probably the definition of being awesome, but when your purple lightning fails to kill anyone people eventually switch to other classes. In fact, Darkness excels at shooting purple lightning and yet I'm sure people played Assassins thought they're supposed to be some kind of awesome lightsaber wielding maniac. But in the end twirling your double bladed lightsaber (Deception) just gets you killed while shooting purple lightning, which isn't what you signed up to do as an Assassin, actually works pretty darn well, and the results speak for themselves.

[Cindarstorm]

Honestly, I find my infil shadow to do just fine right now. She excels at solo node taking, and is quite good for solo defense when needed. In other areas she is worse off than other dps, but not so badly so that it bothers me tremendously.

 

That said, I would have absolutely no problem with bioware making her even more powerful..