Sentinel and Marauder Changes

[wadecounty]

The one thing I would recommend is please, for the love of God, DO NOT listen to the suggestions made on these forums. Most of the player base is awful at this game and nothing they say should be taken seriously. On the flip side, Aluvien is probably the most knowledgeable sentinel in the game, and you should listen to everything he says.

 

This. +1

[g_mK]

I assume by Force Mend you mean Force Rend/Melt, and not the Sage self heal. If you are suggesting turning it into a passive though, that would be against the devs current goals of each spec to have four active abilities. They would have to turn it into a replacement for Vicious slash or something and attach the DoT to some other passive for that to work..

 

Yeah, I meant Force Rend/Melt

[CycloH]

I'm glad we got a response... but I already switched out my main so I hope it's not too late. I know many other classes have gone through a lot longer delays to learn when their class would see improvements... and I can (and always could) live with the fact that it might take a while to get some fixes, but it was a let down to not receive at least an "acknowledgment" for 6+ weeks. That's not exactly in keeping with the mentality of being open and engaged with the community. I appreciate we are getting looked at, but it has lessened my confidence in Bioware for sure.

[orangebowl]

Put the proc back into Rupture/Cauterize. That way my old favorite class is fun to play again. Also I've said it many times. 4.5 second gore is the only way to have gore. (or the 6 second on the GGD one). And i don't think any carnage mara would be sad if we got double gore back.

[HanSollo]

Hey folks,

 

We know there has been concern from the Sentinel and Marauder community about the status of their class, and when they might be receiving changes. Sents and Maras will see changes in update 3.1.1. As a secondary note, it is our plan that in some cases we will also put our minor patches (such as 3.1.1) on PTS. This way we can get some additional testing, especially around class changes.

 

Thanks everyone!

 

-eric

 

Hello Eric,

 

First let me express my utmost gratitude for taking your time to give us an update on when we will be seeing changes to Sentinel/Marauder. Now let me point out a concern I have.

 

Sents and Maras will see changes in update 3.1.1. As a secondary note, it is our plan that in some cases we will also put our minor patches (such as 3.1.1) on PTS.

 

Here you state that the changes to Sentinel/Marauder will come in patch 3.1.1. and that this is a minor patch. I understand that minor patches don't necessarily mean that the changes will be insignificant, but it does imply that any changes to class will be relativity minor. Will the changes be minor, or will we see some noticeable changes.

 

Another request that is prevalent on the forums is Deadly Throw/Crippling Throw, and its return, is this a possibility?

 

There seems to be some frustration during the leveling process as well, I can attest to this since I am now leveling a second Sentinel on another server in an effort to try to relearn how to play the class. It is more difficult this go round then it was when I knew absolutely nothing about the class. Are you guys planning to address this in some way?

 

Again Thank you for your time.

[Kaos_KidSWTOR]

Ok, here's my little mini-wishlist for each Spec.

 

Watchman/Anni:

 

Hemorrhaging Smash gets renamed to Hemorrhaging Throw, and works with Dual Saber Throw.

 

OR.

 

Pulverize now buffs the damage of Smash by 100% instead of Dual Saber Throw.

 

Reduce the CD of Annihilate by 0.5s to make Swift Demise always have 3 stacks when Force Rend's DoT ends and needs to be refreshed.

 

Remove Close Quarters.

 

Combat/Carnage:

 

Either: Double 3s Gore on a proc OR Single Gore at a 4.5s duration.

 

Concentration/Fury:

 

Remove Obliterate.

 

Increase the damage of Furious Strike/Concetrated Slice by 3%

 

Overall:

 

Close Quarters is now a passive for All Marauders.

[Bugattiboy]

1 - Remove the new dot from the game.

2 - Make Cauterize/Rupture tick every second.

3 - Bring back the reset proc on Cauterize/Rupture.

1. Don't need to remove it. Make the new dot replace Cauterize in the same manner Penetrating Rounds replaces Speed Shot.

 

2. Yes

 

3. Yes.

 

In other words, revert Cauterize and Mind Sear back their 2.10 functionality and make Force Melt replace Cauterize. The 3.0 proc on Mind Sear is terrible. What is the sense of having an internal cooldown on an active skill?

Edited January 16, 2015 by Bugattiboy

[FlyinSpaghetti]

I know a lot of the focus in this thread is to do with force melt/rend but regarding TST and mind sear proc, often the case it will proc while on cooldown and by time it comes off cooldown the proc is gone and it wont proc again for a while.

 

I feel the proc needs to last a bit longer and a bit less RNG on it proccing.

 

As for force melt I'd rather it cost accelerating victory stacks rather than focus, not respect the global cooldown and each use of it consumes all stacks gained but each additional stack consumed increases it's critical damage.

 

Return cauterize to it's original way pre 3.0, and as someone else mentioned put the DoT spread on TST.

[Dyvim]

...

 

Return cauterize to it's original way pre 3.0, and as someone else mentioned put the DoT spread on TST.

 

Cauterize is fine now, but dot spreading via TST is brilliant, and more in line with how serenity shadows can spread their dots from 30m with FiB....

[K_osss]

Ok my standpoint is largely from a PvP perspective first of all, and secondly I think our damage is pretty good in that environment. My main concerns are with survivability and mobility in that order.

 

I'd like to see some sentinel specific ability tweaks to GBTF and transcendence.

 

In regards to GBTF I think that it the health cost needs to be looked at. Right now in the Ranked scene I will generally die having taken somewhere less than 60k damage. My health is 41.5k and medpack is like 12k or so. Generally other classes are in the 90-100k damage taken before they die. I definitely get that we've got other defensive CD's but I think the 50% health at the end is pretty steep. Maybe look at no health cost, or if that's OP then 25 to 50% up front.

 

I also think many of the Heroic utilities are not very creative and or lackluster such as the CD reduction (enduring ) and 2 second increase (force aegis) to GBTF heroic utility should just be rolled into one. I think that Just Pursuit should just go away. It's hilariously terrible right now. Maybe add back crippling throw and put a rooting utility in. Maybe add a utility to improve Transcendence's defensive increase. Something like gives the sentinel 20 or 30% increased defensive chance for the duration. Or maybe a utility that adds a 10% DR along with Transcendence to the Sentinel only. Could also bake the root break and Fleetfooted speed into the base Transcendence ability.

 

Those are just some ideas and couldn't all be implemented or Sentinels would be very overpowered. Pick and choose but I'd like to see something done to GBTF and Transcendence and I think adding Crippling Throw back in would be a great step in the right direction!

[Khryn]

I don't think they are going to remove an ability, especially a "new" one that is the final two gains post 55.

 

This does give us hope though! I love my Sentinel.

[Emperor-Norton]

WTB:

Watchman rotation changes to reflect pre-3.0 with Cauterize proc. Keep the procs for TST, and keep Force Melt.

 

Guarded by the Force changes. Health on Activation and usable while stunned.

 

Transcendence on a CD, with no Centering, and some kind of movement protection (movement protection for user only). Having 80% movement speed may be overkill.

 

I know a lot of the focus in this thread is to do with force melt/rend but regarding TST and mind sear proc, often the case it will proc while on cooldown and by time it comes off cooldown the proc is gone and it wont proc again for a while.

 

I feel the proc needs to last a bit longer and a bit less RNG on it proccing.

 

As for force melt I'd rather it cost accelerating victory stacks rather than focus, not respect the global cooldown and each use of it consumes all stacks gained but each additional stack consumed increases it's critical damage.

 

Return cauterize to it's original way pre 3.0, and as someone else mentioned put the DoT spread on TST.

I think TST just needs a upping of it's proc chance from 20%.

 

I am not sure about having Force Melt only cost AV and always be off the GCD. Especially if it needs 3 stacks of AV since it would punish really hard on early target death. But it made me think of having 3 stacks of AV make it free and activate off the GCD. Which I find an... interesting idea. Would certainly help with using GCDs for the whole proc Cauterize dynamic.

 

And yes, add Dot Spread to TST.

Edited January 17, 2015 by Emperor-Norton

[CallMeBobby]

Is there any chance you can look into a problem I'm having with my Sage? On Taris and Nar Shaddaa I can only learn my consular abilities, have to go to fleet to learn Sage abilities. Very annoying, I gave up on the thing until someone gives me an answer.

[TACeMossie]

WTB:

Watchman rotation changes to reflect pre-3.0 with Cauterize proc. Keep the procs for TST, and keep Force Melt.

 

Guarded by the Force changes. Health on Activation and usable while stunned.

 

Transcendence on a CD, with no Centering, and some kind of movement protection. Having 80% movement speed may be overkill.

 

I think TST just needs a upping of it's proc chance from 20%.

 

I am not sure about having Force Melt only cost AV and always be off the GCD. Especially if it needs 3 stacks of AV since it would punish really hard on early target death. But it made me think of having 3 stacks of AV make it free and activate off the GCD. Which I find an... interesting idea. Would certainly help with using GCDs for the whole proc Cauterize dynamic.

 

And yes, add Dot Spread to TST.

 

 

Mace has got it down. Well, I'd probably change a couple of things, but regardless:

 

What I would do - Sentinel terms because reasons!

 

 

UNIVERSAL:

 

Transcendance on 15 second cooldown, given a focus cost to prevent too much spamming.

4 focus so when paired with Strike, it costs the same as using a Blade Rush/Slash/Dispatch in that GCD, though reduce the cost to 3 focus under Combat Sent Zen when Efficient Strikes is picked up.

 

Guarded by the force now has an up-front health cost.

 

UTILITIES

 

Incisor is redesigned. It now applies a 3 second root on using said abilities instead of a 6 second 50% slow.

 

Just Pursuit is also redesigned. It now reduces the cost of both Transcendence and Leg Slash by 2 each, and now applies the 3 second root on any use of leg slash. The slow of leg slash is applied after the root wears off.

 

Enduring now additionally reduces the Health Cost of Guarded by the Force to 25% (from 50%)

 

WATCHMAN:

 

Cauterize ticks twice as often but lasts 6 seconds. Its damage per second remains unchanged.

 

Burning Sweep renamed to Searing Throw:

 

"Twin Saber Throw now spreads Cauterize and Force Melt onto all targets hit. In addtion, your burns have a 20% chance to increase the damage of your next Twin Saber Throw by 100%"

 

Merciless Zeal: Heals increased to 2% from 1%

 

Plasma Blades: Lockout Removed

Burning Focus: Lockout Removed

 

Mind Sear: "Merciless Slash and Dispatch have a 75% chance and Slash has a 45% chance to make your next Cauterize free."

 

COMBAT:

 

Pretty much perfect, but if I had to do something, I'd do this:

 

Atayru Form available by default. New ability added that does a decent level of weapon damage followed by an elemental component for 6 seconds. 12 second cooldown, 2 focus cost. Affected by Efficient Strikes.

Abilities now provided at:

 

Blade Rush: 10

Precision: 26

[New Ability]: 41

Clashing Blast: 57

 

CONCENTRATION:

 

Don't touch this, you'll break it D:

 

 

 

Edited January 17, 2015 by TACeMossie

[Sapperlot]

- Remove the new Dot - give a hard hitting (with the 3 Anni stacks) instant or an Anni replacement instead. There are enough keybinds that we have to use only to do our job. 13 without def-cd´s, berserk and the rest are enough in my opinion.

- Return to the old ruptue proc. That should give back the fun to this.

- Spread the rupture dot + 2 Stacks deadly saber via DST. The dotspread with smash don´t fit at all. It makes no sense to me. Other classes spread their dot´s with skills they use anyway. We use DST anyway.

- give back the old UR, the health loss is now unnecessary.

But most important is:

Please remove this new Dot. It feels so forced in the rota. The old way Anni was such a fun to play. Now you stand there and it feels that you do "nothing".

[TACeMossie]

- Remove the new Dot - give a hard hitting (with the 3 Anni stacks) instant or an Anni replacement instead. There are enough keybinds that we have to use only to do our job. 13 without def-cd´s, berserk and the rest are enough in my opinion.

- Return to the old ruptue proc. That should give back the fun to this.

- Spread the rupture dot + 2 Stacks deadly saber via DST. The dotspread with smash don´t fit at all. It makes no sense to me. Other classes spread their dot´s with skills they use anyway. We use DST anyway.

- give back the old UR, the health loss is now unnecessary.

But most important is:

Please remove this new Dot. It feels so forced in the rota. The old way Anni was such a fun to play. Now you stand there and it feels that you do "nothing".

 

The new DoT is fine on a sentinel. The issue is that the animation sucks for marauders and needs massive improvements.

[Projawa]

WTB:

Watchman rotation changes to reflect pre-3.0 with Cauterize proc. Keep the procs for TST, and keep Force Melt.

 

Guarded by the Force changes. Health on Activation and usable while stunned.

 

Transcendence on a CD, with no Centering, and some kind of movement protection. Having 80% movement speed may be overkill.

 

 

I think TST just needs a upping of it's proc chance from 20%.

 

I am not sure about having Force Melt only cost AV and always be off the GCD. Especially if it needs 3 stacks of AV since it would punish really hard on early target death. But it made me think of having 3 stacks of AV make it free and activate off the GCD. Which I find an... interesting idea. Would certainly help with using GCDs for the whole proc Cauterize dynamic.

 

And yes, add Dot Spread to TST.

 

And make Devastating Blast's visuals/soundfx more like Force Scream

Edited January 17, 2015 by Projawa

[TakoyaKii]

This is a joke right? I get 0 deaths in wz's as combat sent, because I choose targets carefully, burst them down and disappear like smoke. What the hell's wrong with sents atm? They're fine.

 

I just am concerned that BW will over-buff it, leading to imbalance.

For carnage/combat I agree with you except some sort of immunity to some of the roots or maybe default breaker on camo.

Anni/watchman needs a better way to spread dots and it's totally fine! or remove melt/rend and make a new spread ability that does dmg.

Rage/fury seems pretty good also needs mobility improvements like carnage

[The_X]

Oh. My. GOD... they finally said something. However... AFTER everybody else who doesn't NEED it gets adjusted, and AFTER ranked goes live... THEN we get some changes, whatever those might be. Yeah... too little too late. I hope you plan to restore my carnage marauder to 3.0 cause I've already got one foot out the door.

[Mission_dj]

Please do not revert Cauterize back to proc. There was occasions pre-3.0 where, if you were unlucky, cauterize wouldn't be on the target.

 

Force Melt is also not an issue imo. People are saying the timing is hard, but if you hit every Merc Slash off CD, then FM will still have a second before it needs to be refreshed. The issue here is people need to learn how to play with it rather than just saying it doesn't fit. It took me a few fair runs on the Ops dummy at 60 to really get the rotation down.

 

The main issue lies in that Watchman is not really viable for bursting targets down. The problem there though is that if anything get's buffed, it's going to effect PvE to the point where Sents will be OP. I am already parsing in the high 4k's in 192 gear.

 

There are however changes mentioned here I like

 

DoT spread with TST.

Crippling Throw return, maybe just the root and not the healing debuff.

TST proc higher chance and proc lasts longer.

Unremitting.

[Dyvim]

Please do not revert Cauterize back to proc. There was occasions pre-3.0 where, if you were unlucky, cauterize wouldn't be on the target.

 

Force Melt is also not an issue imo. People are saying the timing is hard, but if you hit every Merc Slash off CD, then FM will still have a second before it needs to be refreshed. The issue here is people need to learn how to play with it rather than just saying it doesn't fit. It took me a few fair runs on the Ops dummy at 60 to really get the rotation down.

 

The main issue lies in that Watchman is not really viable for bursting targets down. The problem there though is that if anything get's buffed, it's going to effect PvE to the point where Sents will be OP. I am already parsing in the high 4k's in 192 gear.

 

There are however changes mentioned here I like

 

DoT spread with TST.

Crippling Throw return, maybe just the root and not the healing debuff.

TST proc higher chance and proc lasts longer.

Unremitting.

 

I agree with those. TBH unremitting is A MUST. PERIOD. Otherwise, devs need to explain why they feel vigi/veng builds deserve it for free and we don't. I mean they don't even have to spend a utility point for cc immunity about 25% of the time. THAT IS HUGE.

[Emperor-Norton]

People who want to replace Force Melt with any form of Cauterize or Annihilate improvement, that isn't how trees work. Anything you get in the Tree is going to be used as part of the rotation. Unless you actually want to give people Annihilate, then 10 levels say "Here is a better Annihilate, use this instead". So you can't do an improved Cauterize, Merciless or Overload Saber.

 

People already mentioned Slash, but I am not really sure since it isn't really important to the spec like Ion Pulse was for Tactics. Plus i already like the animation for Slash. The only thing I could think of is a new ability that generates 4 Focus and allows you to use your Leap for Leaping. However I prefer having Force Melt.

 

Please do not revert Cauterize back to proc. There was occasions pre-3.0 where, if you were unlucky, cauterize wouldn't be on the target.

 

The main issue lies in that Watchman is not really viable for bursting targets down. The problem there though is that if anything get's buffed, it's going to effect PvE to the point where Sents will be OP. I am already parsing in the high 4k's in 192 gear.

 

Unremitting.

Not having the dot up is a basic byproduct of the RNG proc, and people like it for reasons stated ad nauseam. Having it put back in is non-negotiable because people won't will go back to PvE Mara until it is restored.

 

Dot specs should never be good at bursting people down. The Master Strike into a Merciless is decently bursty (especially with 6 piece). On another note, I still like the idea of upping Master Strike's damage a bit and making it a ~30 second cooldown for Watchman again. Especially when the proc is back in place.

 

Unremitting is something exclusive to Vengeance Juggs to make up for an overreliance on Ravage. It isn't needed for Sentinels, doesn't fit the idea and feel of Sentinels, and should stay exclusive to that spec.

[xvlasis]

carnage needs gore to be back to 4+ seconds , 3 seconds is not viable .Also we need something to stop being treated like a tennis ball,some sort of cc immunity close to juggs immunity after leap.

[mastervalkar]

I rarely play my Sentinel, because every other AC right now is much better off (yes Cpt. Obvious here). Here's my take on What can be done to each spec

 

Watchmen/Annihilation:

- Make Force Rend/Melt into a saber strike ability similar to Lethal Shot/Dirty Blast of the Sniper/Slinger. Have it do light weapon damage and light amount of a elemental or internal damage mixed together for medium damage overall. Maybe have it grant an extra stack of Juyo on use. Have it replace Slash/Vicious Slash. This fills a deep hole in the rotation and takes away spam-able DoT that no one likes. Basically Watchmen/Annih's version or Blade Rush/Massacre

- If the above idea can't work, put a 9-12 sec CD on Melt/Rend

- Return the Cauterize/Rupture reset proc. It made the entire rotation flow. Right now the Mind Seer proc with DST with Rend/Melt in the mix seems wrong and confusing

- Replace Cauterize/Rupture's CD, maybe in the 6-9 sec range, with the proc returned

- Put the DoT spread in both Smash and DST

 

Combat/Carnage

- Of course put PS/Gore back at the 4.5 sec window, or be cool and give us the 6 sec window you talked about pre-3.0 previews and in the streams

- Get rid of the Blade Storm/Force Scream replacements and create a heavy-hitting ability the also procs Ataru form on hit. Basically Concentrated Slice with added Ataru proc damage. This will fill in a gap in the rotation as Combat/Carnage has the least amount of abilities used rotationally of any Discipline out there currently.

- Take the extra damage from the Scream/Storm replacement and add a new passive that increased the base damage of Storm/Scream by 10% while keeping the Execute/Opportune Attack proc

 

Concentration/Fury:

- Remove Sweep/Smash from the Koan/Destruction proc's buff and increase the proc's damage buff from 15 to 20%

- Increase the buff from Swelling Wind/Decimate for Sweep/Smash from 45% to 60% to keep this spec's AoE where it is w/o need of wasting Koan/Destruction on Sweep/Smash

- Remove Force Exhaustion/Force Crush from the game and have Master Strike/Ravage provide the stacks of Koan/Destruction instead, 1 per tick of MS/Rav. Same 3 sec window for gaining stacks, makes MS/Rav a real part of the rotation. (This should also be the change for Guardians and Juggernauts as well.)

- Blade Storm/Force Scream takes Force Exhaustion/Force Crush's spot in the rotation, making the Momentum/Battle Cry proc useful, and reducing ability bloat. Increase the damage buff from 5% to 10%

Edited January 17, 2015 by mastervalkar

[CameoCream]

A big issue is the new 6 piece being utter trash compared to old set bonus, and to some of the new class 6 piece sets.

 

One critical hit per minute does not make up for the loss of 1% extra damage for 5 seconds, nor does the extra main-stat gained affect the overall damage dealt.

When you can have 6% for a short duration using the old 4 piece with the new 2 piece. Currently, using the new 6 piece is not optimal.

 

This should be altered and will give us a decent boost for PvE.