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How much better is Annihilation for leveling than Carnage?

ProjectAwesome

By ProjectAwesome
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ProjectAwesome

ProjectAwesome

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So I've seen all the posts about people saying Marauders are bad and then a bunch of people saying that they're noobs and marauders are fine etc. etc.

 

Well, as it turns out I'm encountering trouble. A lot of trouble. I'm a level 35 Carnage Marauder. I kill things fine. I use my tools. I crit-force-scream into pommel smash, I force choke strongs, I keep cloak of pain up and I use obfuscate (I even force camo aggro onto vette when I need to). I only die when I accidentally pull an additional pack or something.

 

But still, though I make it out fine in individual fights, I always end up low on health. Even against a bunch of normal mobs, I end up at at least 50%; for packs with a strong mob, sometimes as low as 30% -- and to take down an elite, I need all my cooldowns and a medpack and vette often dies too, and I finish around 20% HP.

 

Yes I know I could use Quinn, but I've tried it and there's no real difference. My healing goes up but the damage dealt goes down, and so it ends up about the same but takes longer to finish fights. My gear is fine too. It maybe isn't all level 35 blues - but it is as much as would be expected from questing. It is very frustrating. Not because I can't do it or even because it is hard to solo - it just takes so damn long. Every fight I have to channel hatred for at least 10 seconds. It gets annoying. Compared to my Lightning Sorcerer, it just takes so damn long.

 

Well, I was looking into Annihilation. At first I dismissed the DoT Healing as negligible, but when I really look at it... 2% of your HP when you crit is nice. But that's not all - I'd have a real use for Berserk. When leveling as Carnage Berserk rarely increases my DPS by much it seems, but as Annihilation, it guarantees 3% HP back every DoT tick for a while. That seems like an awfully nice heal to have every other fight or so, in addition to the normal heals from regular DoT crits.

 

So I have to ask, is my spec the problem? Those of you who found leveling as Marauder manageable, were you annihilation? Is the healing that big of a deal? Does the damage suffer, or is it comparable to carnage? Is it worth not having cool autocrit force screams?

 

Help me out here. At this point I'm waiting for my friends to catch up with me and group up in a pack of 3 because I can't stand to level my marauder with having to channel hatred for 10 seconds after every single fight.

 

 

UPDATE: OKAY WHAT THE ****.

 

I have no idea how the hell that works but wow. Not am I staying so much higher on health but I'm pretty sure things are dying faster too. Wow. I don't get it. It doesn't make sense but whatever. I'm not even using all my cooldowns anymore and I have no clue what I'm doing with Anni but wow that makes such a huge difference. Thanks guys.

 

Jeez. I don't believe the swing. Wow. Suddenly Marauder is playable, good even.

 

So yeah, if you're a marauder who is carnage or rage and you're having trouble leveling... try annihilation. I suggested it to my two marauder friends and they both have suddenly had an enormous increase in their capacity to beat the **** out of things nonstop. It is pretty cool.

Edited by ProjectAwesome
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Alegoss

Alegoss

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Annihilation is quite good in a way that you can distress healers a bit as swtor

has a special way how to handle healing , you aint really going OOM like we say but everyone taking lots more damage stresses their rescource management a lot.

 

so i guess when you have some AOE going you can use your CD to reduce the damage

as well as the heal from the Dots keep healing you and if you are far down still chunck a pot and of you go without stressing the healers.

 

It just requires you to be on the ball and keep your dots up.

 

i love Annihilation spec (keep the spec :p)

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Voblat

Voblat

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I've had no problems as an annihilation spec, havent touched seeping wound, but took everything else.

 

You'll get berserk every single fight by the time your level 38 or so, with all the extra rage generation you get through the skill tree.Twice if you're fighting a gold.

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ProjectAwesome

ProjectAwesome

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OKAY WHAT THE ****.

 

I have no idea how the hell that works but wow. Not am I staying so much higher on health but I'm pretty sure things are dying faster too. Wow. I don't get it. It doesn't make sense but whatever. I'm not even using all my cooldowns anymore and I have no clue what I'm doing with Anni but wow that makes such a huge difference. Thanks guys.

 

Jeez. I don't believe the swing. Wow. Suddenly Marauder is playable, good even.

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SocXiety

SocXiety

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I leveled primarily as Carnage and I also tried out Rage/Anni and if I had to pick one to SOLO with I would say Anni would probably be the best one to go with. However I don't find Marauders great solo class in general. Our damage taken is quite high and there's no real options for us to fix that. Juggernauts by comparison simply walk through difficult pulls with high mitigation from all their shields and gear by comparison. So with that I mostly leveled in a duo with a heal spec Sorc.
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Thundergulch

Thundergulch

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I leveled primarily as Carnage and I also tried out Rage/Anni and if I had to pick one to SOLO with I would say Anni would probably be the best one to go with. However I don't find Marauders great solo class in general. Our damage taken is quite high and there's no real options for us to fix that. Juggernauts by comparison simply walk through difficult pulls with high mitigation from all their shields and gear by comparison. So with that I mostly leveled in a duo with a heal spec Sorc.

 

I guess it's all a matter of playstyle, I have a 30 Jugg and a 30 Marauder.... if I take let's say a group of 6 mobs 2 levels higher than me my Marauder will kill them so fast and my health will hardly have a dent in it.

My dps Jugg would take at least twice as long if not 3x longer to kill the same group of mobs IF he survived.

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SocXiety

SocXiety

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I guess it's all a matter of playstyle, I have a 30 Jugg and a 30 Marauder.... if I take let's say a group of 6 mobs 2 levels higher than me my Marauder will kill them so fast and my health will hardly have a dent in it.

My dps Jugg would take at least twice as long if not 3x longer to kill the same group of mobs IF he survived.

 

Depends on your level vs the mobs level and their relative health. But there is some packs of mobs you can run right through if they're normals yeah. A good smash and proper tabbing through quickly. But I was referring more to golds and champions being a real issue for a marauder to solo a lot of the time. My Juggy friend however just laughs at them and punches em in the face hehe

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ProjectAwesome

ProjectAwesome

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Yeah, suddenly I'm killing elites without using a single cooldown, not even cloak of pain, and ending the fight with only half HP. That is such a massive shift I can't even believe it. This is such an amazing switch... It is just as smooth as my Sorc. Well, not *quite* as smooth (Chain Lightning is ridiculous) but wow still. Edited by ProjectAwesome
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ProjectAwesome

ProjectAwesome

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no point in reducing the CD on rupture IMO it is already pretty short and you have DS to cycle through as well. save those 2 SP for something useful

 

/2cent

 

It has only half up-time without the talent... And it's not like there are a lot of better non-PvP places to put those points in the tree anyways.

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EasymodeX

EasymodeX

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Lvl 20 when you can get deadly saber

 

Wrong answer:

 

Enraged Slash is the #1 marauder talent, so by level 14 he can have the best talent he can possibly invest in ...

 

Or something else.

 

^_^

 

Edit: And then Quick Recovery is massive for solo PvE. Not so much the the cooldown, but the fact that you can blow a Smash right off the bat and still have rage to kill the mob while it's stunned, notably reducing total incoming damage for the fight.

Edited by EasymodeX
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Lashlarue

Lashlarue

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Anni, for me by far, has been the fastest in terms of leveling. But I don't know if I approach it the same way others do. I'll switch targets once one has about 10 or 15 percent health left because I know the bleed from rupture/deadly saber is going to kill it for me rage cost free.

 

So, I'll tab off a live target knowing it will be dead within the next couple of seconds without me having to do anything.

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Nelltarion

Nelltarion

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So yeah, if you're a marauder who is carnage or rage and you're having trouble leveling... try annihilation. I suggested it to my two marauder friends and they both have suddenly had an enormous increase in their capacity to beat the **** out of things nonstop. It is pretty cool.

 

Yeah but.. this doesn't really make sense. I mean, around 50-60% AT LEAST of the mobs are normal and in packs of 4-5. Hence, there isn't really much time for the dots to tick before they die, so a lot of the damage is wasted and more importantly you ain't healed for that much. I just switched to Anni in order to try it, but more often than not mobs die before I can apply 3 stacks of Deadly Sabers and honestly I'm not leaving fights with that much more HP compared to Carnage.

 

Am I doing something wrong?

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EasymodeX

EasymodeX

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Yeah but.. this doesn't really make sense. I mean, around 50-60% AT LEAST of the mobs are normal and in packs of 4-5. Hence, there isn't really much time for the dots to tick before they die, so a lot of the damage is wasted and more importantly you ain't healed for that much. I just switched to Anni in order to try it, but more often than not mobs die before I can apply 3 stacks of Deadly Sabers and honestly I'm not leaving fights with that much more HP compared to Carnage.

 

Am I doing something wrong?

 

Yes. Sounds like you are inherently overkilling mobs; e.g. not taking into account your DOTs. You may not really be paying attention to / aware of your DOTs, their potential damage, and when they fire.

 

1. No spec really matters for destroying normal trash. If anything, Rage wins for omega Smash.

 

2. Stop stacking 3 Deadly Sabers on a normal mob. You know it's ******* retarded, so why are you doing it? Hit the mob with a 1 stack of DS + Rupture. It will die. Switch to the other****ing mob tyvm.

 

3. Annihilate will often straight kill a normal mob after the Smash.

 

4. Normal trash doesn't matter. Strongs and Elites matter.

 

 

Example sequence on a normal trash pack:

 

1. Charge.

2. DS mid-air.

3. BA + Retaliation (first mob dead or damn near it, and eating 2 stacks of DS).

4. Smash (by this time I have dragged the mobs together, or they have piled up as much as they are able to).

5. Rupture, Assault (second mob in the process of dying).

6. Annihilate (third mob dead or dying).

7. Check: did the first 3 mobs die? If no: Sweeping Slash.

8. Rupture / Assault / VA the rest of the **** down.

 

Also, in general Cloak of Pain is more effective as a damage reflect against more targets. Popping it mid-charge is a good idea against 5 mobs.

 

The above sequence is a simple example where few DOT ticks are wasted.

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Teladis

Teladis

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Ya, but for us who like carnage we are boned. Here everyone was flaming me saying l2p when, they was using annihilation all this time. I was wondering why people was acting like they are good and can do things as carnage that I could not.

 

 

It makes so much more sense now, Annihilation is the only good pve spec we have.

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