Why should I play my sniper?

[Jaxtaro]

Incidentally, outside of the complaints, there are several reasons to play a sniper.

 

1. No one currently seems to be min/maxing their groups to such a degree that they want everything covered. If they do, it is likely because they're incapable of doing it normally. The idea that just because you're not a classic "hybrid" that you're "worthless" is retarded.

 

2. Snipers already play a hybrid role anyhow. CC is a very valid role, particularly in a droid heavy instance.

 

3. The storyline is really good, and as others have said, the voice acting and character development are good.

 

4. The sniper class is a challenge, and does require a higher skill level to play effectively. That in itself is a rewarding experience. It's not "Neon Lollipops/Gravel Throw invincible", nor do you have the luxury of stealth. You need to have your wits about you, and be 360° alert all the time.

 

5. The Empire is mostly neutral, and it's really easy to be a light side IA (I didn't choose to be, but it's easy as pie to do, and doesn't cost you anything).

 

6. Followthrough... it makes your life much easier.

[Kahzard]

TL:DR: The value of hybrids in groups is very high in this game. As it's a MMO game, value to a group matters. This puts *PURE* DPS at a disadvantage. What should be done?

 

 

The first character I rolled was an agent, at 10 I went sniper thinking it sounded pretty cool. I then rolled a few more characters and played them a bit more. After running a bunch of flashpoints and heroics I came to realize off-heals and to a lesser extent off-tanks, even if specced DPS, offer the same DPS but a lot more value to groups. The difference between success and falure on a tough fight (especailly with a lot of boss mechanics using "random" targeting) can often hinge on a spot heal or two from a DPS or a little tankability.

 

Now that I'm thinking of going back and playing my sniper some more I realize that gropuing (and even solo play to some-extent) will be much harder and I will have less to offer my group. I'm thinking I should have gone the other AC but there's no going back now.

 

So, what should be done? Should pure DPS ACs (advanced classes that have no tanking or healing talent tree) get some advantage (I guess snipers have the longest range in the game but 5m doesn't seem like much of an advantage by giving up the ability to heal some).

 

Any thoughts?

 

First theres no way to really know if you are doing the same dps as another class. However it is safe to say that if you are trying to perform another one of these tasks, off healing or tanking, your dps will drop significantly.

 

I may be lucky on this but I have not ran an encounter where someone needed to off heal unless the main heal was a characters companion. Currently sitting at 40 and just about to clear Hoth, and have ran just about every flash point available. Like I said I could just be very lucky with my groups but the healer has always done his job by theirself while I focused on damage duty.

[Faytte]

Follow through is one of the biggest game play changers any class has access to. Until you get follow through I dont feel you can really understand the dps of this class. Its an instant cast you can cast after a snipe that does more damage than snip and costs 6 energy. Because it eats up a GCD that recovers energy, this more or less eases up your energy curve in combat and allows you to 'spam' more abilities before dipping down into medium energy regen. In pvp where you want burst, you can do a snipe/followthro/takedown for an insane burst.

 

Sniper is a class that comes into its own as your talent it and level up, more so than other classes I feel, and that is mostly due to how we work with our resource. By default we have very pricy powers that if you spam, make you run out of energy, so you feel 'weak'. As you level you start getting cheaper and cheaper options, procs and effects that make you more and more active in your dps role.

[Wollfe]

Here is what I can tell you about the sniper at 50 in the current game after playing on a pvp server and hitting rank 36 and have 5 epics.

 

1. Your damage is virtually the same as every other DPS class. Ive seen BH hit 400, Jugs hit 380, and the best geared sniper on our server has hit 418 in a match a few times. This was due to people standing in his orbital bombardment trying to defuse bombs. Smugs/IA make our dps a joke in pvp. I was hit earlier today by a smug for 4800 then 4400 in the duration of a GCD. So 9200 in 1.5 secconds..ish. Good luck doing that with a sniper.

 

2. Your lack of mobility is a major problem in PVP. Having to set up shop to get access to our main abilites is a neat idea but in practice its a big pile of poop. All someobdy has to do thats ranged is....poke you, then pass beyond the 35 meter point, heal up and go poke you some more. Since we have absolulely no way of healing its rather easy to do. If you want to chase them you have to run after them then drop you cover again, wait for the GCD to go off and hope they are in range. Also since you basically have to permanatly root yourself its extremely easy to LOS us at the end of our casts. Go out of LOS pop heals and voila back in action. I cant tell you how easy this is to do in hutball.

 

3.Our damage is almost entirely physical. Except for explosive probe and the dot, MM sniper does pure physical damage. Sooooooo, everybody mitigates almost all our damage to some degree, this does not take into account the passive saber block on all glow stickers and bubs on sorc/sage before you can evne start to do damage to them. Let me tell you how awesome it is to warm up a 2.5 seccond channel only to have him passively block it while hes running away from me.

 

4. OUR Knockback requires you to enter cover to use. On maps like hutball this is a massive detriment. I cant just run up to someobdy and knockthem off ramps, I have to enter cover first giving them time to move and readjust. I cant tell you how many times this has screwed me. I even blew somebody into the endzone causing the enemy team to score because of the set up time on cover to KB

 

5. Atm I feel we are an extremely mediocre class endgame compared to everything out there. I have been Gravshot by troopers for 3400 Ive had pebbles channeled in my grill for 1200 a tick , shadows have backstabbed me for 3300 and my highest ambush ive had so far in pvp was for 3700. All these numbers are extremely similar to mine except they have a much reduced cast time compared to ambush and the characters are a million time s more mobile.

 

6. Our 5 meter range bonus doesnt feel like much of a bonus to be honest. Im sure that if it was increased it could potentially cause ballance issues, but atm 5 meters isnt much by the time you drop into cover and entrench they have close the 5 meters. If you havent gotten entrench off they have charged you and you havent gotten a shot off. Again like I said this is a personal bias thing the range thing isnt really an issue, more a thing I would like to see but not nescesarrily a needed thing in pvp because again I can see this being a balance issue.

 

7.IF you do get your entrench off in time you can put out as much damage as everybody else does thats a dps class, but your imune to CC so the sniper does have that going for it. Its nice to not have to worry about CC for 20 secconds.

 

Bare in mind this response was written purely from the perspective of a MM sniper. I cant comment on Engi or Lethality at all, I have yet to try them out. Please forgive my spelling and grammatical errors its 7am new years day and i havent gone to bed yet.

Edited January 1, 2012 by Wollfe

[primediusx]

While I understand your concerns about sniper, the truth is that I am regularly in the top three for damage in warzones as a sniper, and have been since about level 20. Snipers aren't perfect, but they can dish out some serious damage and, specced right, can have some serious defense to go with.

 

Yes, we have a timer on most of our damage abilities. However, we can also perch safely out of combat and make kill after kill. Jedi/Sith have to run to their targets. So far I have a hard time buying that snipers are gimped in any way.

[cyadra]

Great voice acting? Amazing story? Shiny ship? What more do you need?

 

I have to admit, that I can already feel this class starting to be underwhelming at level 22ish. And I can tell its very gear intensive.

 

However, the story is great. I actually get lost sometimes in all the story lines, and that is the only thing that keeps my sniper going.

[Wollfe]

Thats because you arent 50 yet. At low levels are damage is great, the higher you get, the less it scales. By 50 your damage is no better than anybody elses. BTW every jedi has a way of closing with you. Shadows cant stealth, Marauders can stealth for the time it takes to close to you, jugs can charge, and sorcs dont need to close. All these people posting about how awesome snipers damage is are sub 50 I garuntee. Every sniper on my server that is 50 is underwhelmed with the class to some extent. Dont get me wrong its not like the class doesnt work. Its just, everything is an uphill battle for the exact same things that other classes can do.

[wessik]

You can disagree all day long, but as long as you confuse accuracy debuffs and evasion with CC, then you don't know what you're talking about. What you have for cc is Debilitate Flashbang, and to a much lesser degree, leg shot.

 

were you thinking of diversion? distraction is an interrupt, not a accuracy debuff. it's not a movement cc per se but it cancels the targets current channeled action and prevents the target from using it for another 4 further seconds... sounds pretty controlling to me...

 

that entire list is useable out of cover and they are able to prolong your survival which is what i was trying to point out... so my counter question is what exactly do you mean by "disorganized"?

 

Debilitate is only usable in melee range.

Legshot is only useful against 100% melee characters

And Flashbang is well.... it could be the most useful of the 3, and it sucks to high heaven.

yes they all have their situational uses to prolong your survival, so what's the point? they work when they are needed...

 

Making lists of skills without any context or statement of usefulness is so ... world of warcraft, it's the actual usefulness of those skills that makes the difference, in the context of your opponents' ability or abilities to overcome those skills.

 

1) never played 1 second of wow,

2) i assumed you knew when you would need to know each of our abilities so i didn't bother explaining them,

- a flashbang will stop a ranged person for 8 sec, so you can get out of range or setup cover, and if they burn their cc removal cooldown (escape equivalent), leg shot them and get out of range... either way, their surprise is gone, and you can setup... distract is very good at screwing up their channeled ranged shots as mentioned before...

 

The fact is that most melee oriented toons also have significant ranged attacks which equal the range of our "snipe" skills and nearly equal the damage without ANY of the limitations provided to us via cover and loss of mobility.

 

use distraction if they are channeled range attacks, my guess is if they are melee, their backup ranged attacks of heavy damage would not be instant... if so, leg shot and create space

 

If you are in need of CC and can spare the time of an ambush, then your definition of "need" differs dramatically from mine, especially since ambush isn't particularly useful without a corresponding legshot, and that's only again, against melee specific toons (read marauders). Cover pulse is good, and many of the skills out of context are also "good" but they're disorganized, and are far too weak, and mostly meaningless against moderate ranged killers (such as BH's and sorcerers).

 

FYI i don't have ambush knockback specced... flashbang, legshot and distract appropriately... you sustain zero damage when you're out of range

 

There should be instead: 1-2 standing CC's that are effective vs. melee, 1-2 that are effective vs. ranged.

 

we do... as mentioned above...

 

A burst speed buff to create a gap is appropriate as well.

 

Entrench is an insult, as it should be full time as a skill. The notion that you should be able to be taken out of cover, which is by far the biggest debuff in the entire game, bar none as a MM sniper is really lame.

 

i agree, it would be nice, but i'm sure everyone would call it op... just like snipers having stealth... every class needs a counter...

 

Maybe you only fight marauders or soloing 100% melee toons, but your suggestion is instant snared death when playing against any kind of competent opponent. The only way to escape and reset that actually works is can the knife, debilitate and take off while they're deibilitated. If you have time or the LOS to flash bang, then that's not really a pressure situation.

 

you just repeated my suggestion... debilitate, leg shot and run...

 

 

How is dropping into cover in the face of an opponent in any way, shape or form, playing the style of the sniper?

like i said, my simple answer is because i'm not about RP when a boss fight starts... i shoot the same damage and get the same defense at 5m as 35m, so that's what i do... i just want to start killing him... in fact, it's better that we start off next to the boss cuz if we really need to, we debilitate and back up...

 

How on earth is it even remotely like being able to set up your fight in advance, CCing the strong, and picking off the weak then focusing on the strong, particularly when due to range, one or more are often not even in your field of view? The fact is that the mechanics of NPC conversations place snipers at a tremendous disadvantage in those boss fights. That's lazy programming or lack of foresight by the game design staff. There re several solutions, especially since pretty much all of them are in sniper specific instances... such as debuffing the melee damage of the opponent for the first 15 seconds of a fight, or altering them so the sniper "escapes" and gets his ranged and opening advantage, etc etc.

 

i play with the camera zoomed back all the way so i don't have any field of view issues... scroll mouse out if you are???

 

debilitate and flashbang gives you plenty of time to drop into cover and start attacking what you need to attack... hold RMB, look at your target, tab to target, kill... RMB, turn to 2nd target, tab, kill... focus on boss... /shrug

 

i'm not going to argue programming or game design, i just said it's possible to deal with the situation...

 

I'm sorry you're so confused, when I said "you fail at game design", I was insulting Deacons, who made a statement that was completely ignorant of how good balance occurs, I wasn't talking about Bioware.

 

my mistake then...

 

 

see yellow