Here is a compilation of posts explaining the problem with marauders. The problem with marauders is they just have too much. Too much of what? Everything Despite being the highest DPS Adv. Class in the game they have far to much utility and defensive capabilities built in. Undying Rage is probably the biggest offender. Most marauders will argue that losing 50% of their current health is a huge cripple. What is 50% of your health when you only have 500 HP? Nothing at that point, It just allows a guaranteed 5 seconds of invincibility. Saber ward is the next largest offender. What it does it pretty much gimp you (As a Powertech) for 12 seconds. With another 50% Melee and Ranged Defense the Marauder will pretty much deflect any rail shot that you have causing you to hold off using this ability for 12 seconds. Your remaining damaging abilities will also be cut down in damage by 25% (Dots, Rocket Punch, Flame Burst, Thermal Detonator). I wouldn't have such a beef with cloak of pain given that either they removed the second effect of it or also added the second effect to Energy shield. 20% Damage reduction for 6 seconds doesn't seem like it helps much until the second effect kicks in and it lasts 30 seconds. The worst part? It has a 60 second cooldown. Predation is a rough ability to deal with. Not only will it make the enemy marauder able to dance circles around you but it serves as a defensive cooldown as well as an escape. 10% defense looks small on paper until they can deflect your rail shot completely. Obfuscate is a huge pain to deal with. Luckily most Marauders (All the bad ones) will often not even use this skill. 90% accuracy reduction of their target for 6 seconds is a massive, massive crutch. If it wasn't bad enough that a marauder needed an unnecessary amount of defensive cooldowns they also have the ability to just take off if things don't go their way with Force Camouflage. This coupled with predation is almost a guaranteed escape. Unfortunately "saving your stuns" doesn't work when the enemy can chain defensive cooldowns for 57 seconds [12(saber Ward) + 30 (Cloak of Pain) + 10(Predation) + 5(Undying rage)] In addition to another 6 of your inability to hit your target. They have five defensive cooldowns, an offensive accuracy cripple, two escape and more damage as as opposed to a Powertechs one cooldown, and two stuns. Now on an offensive standpoint marauders are clearly just as broken as they are defensively. As a Adrenaline/Rage resource class (Which counts as an "unlimited resource pool") the idea behind balancing these types of classes comes from resource generation. For example in WoW a warrior's combat charge would Cost rage instead of generate, as the non-combat charge would generate a small portion of the resource pool. After the initial charge the resource generation would come from auto-attacks and taking damage where abilities would spend the resource that you gained. Marauders and Sentinels apparently don't have to abide by this basic balancing rule. Instead they can generate almost a full pool of their resource seconds after engaging in combat simply by charging in and using Zealous Strike/Battering assault. This is an incredibly bad design flaw because now within a ridiculously short time span the Marauder can simply unload a plethora of damage on the enemy without any drawbacks. In addition to a much too easy to gain resource, Marauders and Sentinels also have another resource that comes pretty much free from using abilities (From Fury/Zen). This provides the Sent with extra and free utility skills without having to use their actual resource pool. My suggestion would be to remove the resource gain on charge completely. Lower the resource gain on Zealous Strike/Battering assault by around three and reduce the damage of the resource dump skills Vicious Slash/Slash. (I didn't include the Combat/Carnage 31 Pt talent because it is underpowered as is). This would allow the warrior basic attack skill to actually be used often as the main resource gain. Of course anybody who mains a marauder will disagree with me because they are in face first, rather than taking a step back and looking at the whole picture. For reference I am not one sided, I have a 50 Sentinel (BM), a 50 Sorcerer (BM+Rakata) and a 50 Powertech (Rakata). I have played an extensive amount in both PvP and PvE with each character as well. #1. Yes they are extremely overpowered #2. No class needs one minute full of defensive cooldowns. #3. No class should be able to 1v1 every other class if the balance team is doing their job. #4. No class should have a counter that sounds like this "Don't 1v1 us, run and find friends because we're balanced by 3v1 fights!" TL : DR - Don't skip to the bottom actually read it. The point are valid and explainable - From a pre-1.2 BM Sentinel.

If your friend as a commando dps is killing marauders and sentinels then those players NEED to quit. There is no excuse for a Commando taking out a marauder other than the marauder clicks, has only one hand(this is a maybe) or actually literally has down syndrome. There is no top secret way to beating marauders other than inflicting one of these three conditions on them. With a solid minute of chaining defensive cooldowns there isnt a class/spec combo that will 1v1 an equally geared/Skilled marauder. none. As a class that the "rock-paper-scissors" balancing effect isn't applied we have an unnecessary amount of everything. As Annihilation we have heals and a snare built into a main ability (rupture). Many bad warriors argue that the heals from Annihilation dots aren't strong enough to matter however once gear is obtained the amount of times you crit with the dots in combat is ridiculously high, healing for 2% plus another 1% when berserk is used. The "weakness" to rage is latency. If you cant land smash then you lose. If your latency is fine and you cant land smash, uninstall. The weakness to carnage is that it takes one whole global to snare their target. I know right that's just such a cripple!

He's right. Here is a link to a thread that explains a fraction of the marauder problem (From only a defensive standpoint) http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=423347 Now on an offensive standpoint marauders are clearly just as broken as they are defensively. As a Adrenaline/Rage resource class (Which counts as an "unlimited resource pool") the idea behind balancing these types of classes comes from resource generation. For example in WoW a warrior's combat charge would Cost rage instead of generate, as the non-combat charge would generate a small portion of the resource pool. After the initial charge the resource generation would come from auto-attacks and taking damage where abilities would spend the resource that you gained. Marauders and Sentinels apparently don't have to abide by this basic balancing rule. Instead they can generate almost a full pool of their resource seconds after engaging in combat simply by charging in and using Zealous Strike/Battering assault. This is an incredibly bad design flaw because now within a ridiculously short time span the Marauder can simply unload a plethora of damage on the enemy without any drawbacks. In addition to a much too easy to gain resource, Marauders and Sentinels also have another resource that comes pretty much free from using abilities (From Fury/Zen). This provides the Sent with extra and free utility skills without having to use their actual resource pool. My suggestion would be to remove the resource gain on charge completely. Lower the resource gain on Zealous Strike/Battering assault by around three and reduce the damage of the resource dump skills Vicious Slash/Slash. (I didn't include the Combat/Carnage 31 Pt talent because it is underpowered as is). This would allow the warrior basic attack skill to actually be used often as the main resource gain. Of course anybody who mains a marauder will disagree with me because they are in face first, rather than taking a step back and looking at the whole picture. For reference I am not one sided, I have a 50 Sentinel (BM), a 50 Sorcerer (BM+Rakata) and a 50 Powertech (Rakata). I have played an extensive amount in both PvP and PvE with each character as well.

I'm too afraid to try AP actually. It seems very interesting but I don't like how 99% of the damage has to be done within 5 meters of the target. Looks like a quick way to get focused down being that we only have the one cooldown. How is it on an honest PvP basis? Can you put out the damage to take down a healer now? Is it prevalent in 1v1 situations?

I've done a 5840 on Warlord Kephess (Story Mode) in a mixture of Rakata and Black Hole gear. This was with the Biochem Power adrenal active during the boss's last phase.

The problem with marauders is they just have too much. Too much of what? Everything Despite being the highest DPS Adv. Class in the game they have far to much utility and defensive capabilities built in. Undying Rage is probably the biggest offender. Most marauders will argue that losing 50% of their current health is a huge cripple. What is 50% of your health when you only have 500 HP? Nothing at that point, It just allows a guaranteed 5 seconds of invincibility. Saber ward is the next largest offender. What it does it pretty much gimp you (As a Powertech) for 12 seconds. With another 50% Melee and Ranged Defense the Marauder will pretty much deflect any rail shot that you have causing you to hold off using this ability for 12 seconds. Your remaining damaging abilities will also be cut down in damage by 25% (Dots, Rocket Punch, Flame Burst, Thermal Detonator). I wouldn't have such a beef with cloak of pain given that either they removed the second effect of it or also added the second effect to Energy shield. 20% Damage reduction for 6 seconds doesn't seem like it helps much until the second effect kicks in and it lasts 30 seconds. The worst part? It has a 60 second cooldown. Predation is a rough ability to deal with. Not only will it make the enemy marauder able to dance circles around you but it serves as a defensive cooldown as well as an escape. 10% defense looks small on paper until they can deflect your rail shot completely. Obfuscate is a huge pain to deal with. Luckily most Marauders (All the bad ones) will often not even use this skill. 90% accuracy reduction of their target for 6 seconds is a massive, massive crutch. If it wasn't bad enough that a marauder needed an unnecessary amount of defensive cooldowns they also have the ability to just take off if things don't go their way with Force Camouflage. This coupled with predation is almost a guaranteed escape. Unfortunately "saving your stuns" doesn't work when the enemy can chain defensive cooldowns for 57 seconds [12(saber Ward) + 30 (Cloak of Pain) + 10(Predation) + 5(Undying rage)] In addition to another 6 of your inability to hit your target. They have five defensive cooldowns, an offensive accuracy cripple, two escape and more damage as as opposed to a Powertechs one cooldown, and two stuns. TL:DR You can't.

Agreed, I want a blaster rifle. The whole one blaster thing is lame.

Matrix Cube + Internal Damage Relic from Fabricator (KP HM)

IF its going to have a 6 second internal CD they might as well give the us better proc rates on the talent. 100% for Rocket Punch and 50% for Flame burst imo

Fixes are nice but truthfully we need some nerfs to put us back in check with other classes. Four Defensive CD's (Not including Pacify during a 1v1), two escapes, and more burst damage than any other class in the game. Not slightly more burst. Much much more. I've noticed this from playing several different classes including my Sentinal and we certainly arent balanced.

50 Sentinal In Columi/Champ gear with Rakata weapons

Im planning on trying out this hybrid spec when the patch comes. http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#201ZdcMMdRrZcMcRsrk.1 The burst won't be as common as it was pre-1.2 but there is still the potential for heavy burst and you still get to keep those necessary PvP talents that don't even belong in lightning (A.k.a. Backlash and Electric bindings) You now use your Wrath proc's for Crushing Darkness and lightning strike whereas lightning strike has a 30% chance to give you a free Chain Lightning

Are my Merc's and Snipers bad? I am a full Rakata Sorc (Lightning for Ops) excluding MH (As do they but with the MH) but always have second aggro in fights sometimes even pulling off the tank. I personally dont consider any of my fellow raiders to be bad being that we're 4/5 Nightmare EV, 5/5 Nightmare KP. Perhaps Sorc's arent the highest in burst damage but I have also played a Merc and Sniper and notice how quickly the resource of the induvidual class becomes spent. As a sorc I can often run through a full 6 minute fight full rotation without going below 60% force which leads me to believe that our damage is at least on par with other classes.

Im a 5/5 Rakata sorc and I've tried each possible (effective) DPS spec for Sorcs. While 0/13/28 is certainly the highest it does have its resource issues due to CL costing so much force. I can however say that 7/18/16 is certainly not nearly within the same area of damage as either of the 31 point talent specs. 0/13028 hybrid is the highest now due to the bug that allows the double cast of the Force barrage proc which puts this spec about 4%~ higher than that of the 31 specs. However keep in mind that that kind of damage is not consistent in a six minute boss fight and you will find yourself often spamming Force lightning for large amounts of time to regain force. I have personally switched to Lightning for raiding ops (this isnt viable at all for pvp) due to its endless resource pool, heavy burst damage and mostly its involved and interesting play style. Where 31 point madness spec will do just below 1% more damage over the course of a six minute boss fight it is still a DoT spec meaning you will be gimped when burst matters in fights such as Soa (Mind traps and phase three) and Fabricator (Debuff duration) Don't forget as Lightning you wont deal as much damage as madness when a fight calls for mobility such as Gharj, and Karagga. WTB Dual spec!

Against whom? Sages are probably the drop dead worst 1v1 classes. At least Guardians have defensive cooldowns to keep them up, and if PvP spec can AoE-burst for 5k+