Jump to content

How is my first Jedi Sentinel Watchman doing? LONG post! BIG data dump!


Viridionyx

Recommended Posts

Greetings, all!

 

I’m a lvl 26 Jedi Sentinel Watchman whose next big hurdle is defeating Valis. He lit me up the New York Times Square Xmas tree on my first two disastrous attempts. I’ve read several forum posts on the subject, so I now know I have to work the interrupts and keep my back to something. I should state that this is my first character and my first time with an MMORPG. I think I’ve grasped the basic gameplay and have all my Crew Skills above 200 after finally understanding crafting and reverse engineering only a few levels ago. The game still feels HUGE and daunting because I’m not used to MMO’s, but I’m starting to feel like I’m getting the hang of it.

 

If you want, you can skip most of the following text unless you’d have suggestions on how my gear can be improved!

 

I have a few questions about hotkeys after the long gear list!

 

Kira’s gear

 

green Might Device

+16 Str

+14 End

+7 Crit Rat

 

green Field Robes

140 Armor

+17 End

+21 Will

+8 Crit Rat

 

blue Introspection Glove

92 Armor

+25 End

+15 Will

+9 Crit

 

blue Introspection Sash

87 Armor

+17 End

+14 Will

 

green Field Skirt

125 Armor

+21 End

+12 Will

+7 Pow

 

green Field Bracers

78 Armor

+15 End

+12 Will

 

green Cerebral Assault Gen

Focus (Rat 56)

+24 Str

+20 End

+17 Pow

+148 Force Pow

 

green Reinforced Double Saber

+28 Str

+31 End

+14 Crit Rat

+183 Force Pow

 

Viridionyx gear

 

blue Might Device

+21 Str

+17 End

+8 Crit

 

orange Hardened Flexiglass Headgear

206 Armor

+25 Str

+20 End

+8 Pow

 

orange Battleborn Chestguard

226 Armor

+23 Str

+29 End

++8 Crit

 

green Mantellian Ribbed Gauntlets

129 Armor

+21 Str

+16 End

+10 Def Rat

 

purple Fevent Battle Waistcord

174 Armor

+20 Str

+25 End

 

orange Battleborn Greaves

247 Armor

+23 Str

+38 End

+8 Crit Rat

 

purple Kuati Ribbed Footgear

154 Armor

+26 Str

+19 End

+12 Crit Rat

 

blue Ablative Flexiglass Bracers

154 Armor

+22 Str

+11 End

 

orange Saber 1 & 2

92-137 Damage

+27 Str

+39 End

+14 Crit Rat

+183 Force Pow

 

Keyboard

 

1 Saber Ward

2 Force Leap

3 Force Sweep

4 Strike

5 Zealous Strike

6 Cauterize

7 Master Strike

8 Force Kick

9 Juyo Form

0 Sprint usually (Force Stasis?)

- Force Might usually (Heroic Moment?)

= Introspection

 

I know that I need to change these by adding another Quickbar panel to my in-game display. I’ve been using the default settings, and swapping out Force Kick as necessary. However, it seems clear that I need to add a Quickbar so that I can use it for all the abilities with long cooldowns such as the last four Force powers above.

 

Should I have two interrupts ready for Valis?

 

How am I doing? What abilities would you recommend for the above quickbar and for the second? Also, is this the best order for the Force attacks? I would deeply appreciate any suggestions!

 

Thanks!

 

Dave S.

Edited by Viridionyx
Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

1 Saber Ward

2 Force Leap

3 Force Sweep

4 Strike

5 Zealous Strike

6 Cauterize

7 Master Strike

8 Force Kick

9 Juyo Form

0 Sprint usually (Force Stasis?)

- Force Might usually (Heroic Moment?)

= Introspection

 

Disclaimer: This is almost entirely my opinion, and I'm also fairly new to MMOs. This is just what works for me, and what I've learned from observation leveling a watchmen-specced sentinal to 50 and listening to more experienced gamers.

 

First of all, I would agree that you need another quickbar. I usually have four out, actually. Combat abilities that I would need to get to quickly (Mostly attacks), plus Introspection, go on the bottom two. The one of the left is for other in-combat abilities, like med packs and heroic moment stuff, and the one on the right is for out of combat things, like force might and speeder.

 

I'm not sure where on the keyboard your fingers are, but if I'm correct in assuming that you have your pinky on tab, three fingers on the first three number keys, and thumb on space bar, I would suggest moving your abilities around a lot. If not, just take this as a general suggestion about accessibility.

 

You can take sprint off your quickbar entirely. It starts up automatically after a fight is over, and I can't think of a single situation where you would need to get to it so fast that you couldn't open up the abilities window. You can take Juyo form off for the same reason. I would put force kick and force leap in spots where you're not likely to hit them by accident, but can still get to them fast. I use 4 for force kick and 5 for force leap. I like to keep strike on 1 so that I can use it without really thinking about it in between other abilities. You should be using cauterize on every target that's a silver or higher, so make sure that's close.

 

Last of all, a word about non-combat abilities. A friend showed this to me on my sage, and it's simplified my playing a ton. In addition to using my right quickbar for them, he suggested that since I use the arrow keys to move, that I should bind Force Might to numpad 1 and speeder to numpad 2, which makes them easy to use on the run. (I used num zero for the force speed movement speed boost sages get, but you can probably put your buff on 0 and speeder on 1) That way I can hit them with my pinky on the go

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm not at my computer, so I can't load up a sentinel and give you specific advice on your abilities, but because you're still relatively new to MMO's, you hopefully don't have any bad habits that you can't unlearn.

 

Most of your combat abilities will fit on your 2 bottom bars (quickbar 1 and 2). There are a few that won't fit, most of which I just don't use. 24 moves is alot to keep track of whether you have access to them or not. I generally don't use anything that gives me a little extra damage but can only be used on an incapacitated opponent. I also generally don't use super high cost moves that hit several opponents for light damage. I'd rather just focus them down. I do use area of effect moves that do alot of damage and have an activation cooldown, however. Buffs and stances go on a side bar. All my travel abilities go on a side bar. I have a side bar just for all my legacy heroic moment abilities (I love to use them and I have alot of unlocks from playing alts). I also have some convenience abilities (field mail box and field vendor droid) on side bars. There are a few rarely used, but important abilities (the escape from CC move that every class has - I don't pvp) that go on my side bars and I keep track of where they are so I can click them with my mouse if I need them.

 

In MMO's, being able to move around and select different targets at the same time as you activate your abilities is very important. Even more so for a melee damage class like sentinels. If you're trying to use your mouse to do all 3 of those things, you won't be able to do them simultaneously, which will make you less effective.

 

There's a keybind menu in your advanced options and you can keybind all your quickslot buttons to keyboard keys.

 

Try not to use your mouse to move under most circumstances. There are times when holding down both mouse buttons to run forward in an emergency isn't a terrible thing to do, but once you get better and better, you should be able to get away with never even doing that. If that is your primary method of moving forward now, best to stop doing that so your mouse is available to click on enemies.

 

Try not to use your mouse to activate abilities as much as you can. This keybind setup took me several weeks to learn, but I stole it from another forum poster in a different MMO (Age of Conan) and it has elevated my game tremendously. Most MMO players use wasd for movement, but the beauty of moving that to csdf is that it opens up a whole line of your keyboard for use by pinky. Also, when you type in chat, your left fingers naturally rests on asdf, and this keybind puts your fingers on those keys naturally with no need for shifting your whole hand every time you want to type:

 

MOVEMENT

forward: d

strafe left: s

strafe right: f

backward: c

turn left/right: hold down your left mouse button and use the mouse to point your character.

look left/right: hold down your right mouse button and use the moust to point your camera (note: generally only do this while standing still).

 

ABILITIES

companion slot 1: 1 (note: this is always the attack command. It sends your companion to attack your selected target. It's a useful ability to make sure your companion is focused on the guy you want him focused on instead of doing his own thing)

companion slot 2: 2 (note: this is always the follow command. It stops your companion from attacking and makes him run to you. It's an extremely useful command that gets your healer to run quickly to you. It toggles on and off, so you can run around a corner with it toggled on, then toggle it off for a few seconds while your healer heals you, and then displace again if needed to buy yourself time for heals in a long tough fight with corners available to you.)

companion slots 3-12: '3' - '=' (I generally just toggle on what I want him to use and off what I don't and never push these buttons).

 

quickbar 1 slot 1: w

quickbar 1 slot 2: e

quickbar 1 slot 3: r

quickbar 1 slot 4: t

quickbar 1 slot 5: y

quickbar 1 slot 6: g

quickbar 1 slot 7: h

quickbar 1 slot 8: v

quickbar 1 slot 9: x

quickbar 1 slot 10: z

quickbar 1 slot 11: a

quickbar 1 slot 12: q

 

quickbar 2 slot 1: shift + w

quickbar 2 slot 2: shift + e

quickbar 2 slot 3: shift + r

quickbar 2 slot 4: shift + t

quickbar 2 slot 5: shift + y

quickbar 2 slot 6: shift + g

quickbar 2 slot 7: shift + h

quickbar 2 slot 8: shift + v

quickbar 2 slot 9: shift + x

quickbar 2 slot 10: shift + z

quickbar 2 slot 11: shift + a

quickbar 2 slot 12: shift + q

 

A final note: Getting used to using keybinds for all your moves is very hard. You have to commit to it and practice and accept that you will be a worse player for a little while as you force yourself to do something that is very uncomfortable. Once you get used to it, it won't be uncomfortable any more and you'll be a much more effective player. A great keybind set and the ability to use it is probably the single most important tool you can have in terms of skill. Mine is not standard and it might not work for you. I stole it from a great player who I had alot of respect for and I love it, but feel free to modify it or even throw it out. The general advice to find a keybind set that works for you and make yourself use it is solid advice.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

hello Viridionyx and welcome to SWTOR!

 

It's great to see you've done some research and prepared your fight against Valis, and I'd like to help you with some additional comments:

 

- interrupts: your Force kick must be easily reachable on the keyboard, and it must become a reflex if you an ennemy active a technique to shut him down. Personally, I mapped it to "ALT + 1" on my third quickbar (my second quickbar has all the "SHIFT + ". You can also use Force stasis to interrupt (I don't remember if you have it at your level yet) if Force kick is unavailable.

 

- heroic moment: Use "saber ward" first then activate it so that "saber ward" is available again. Don't hesitate to use it as soon as you're at 75% of your life. The healing is minute but steady, so use it early.

 

- I noticed that your Kira is wearing a few strength items while the rest is willpower. Ideally, you should completely deck her out in willpower gear for optimal efficiency.

 

As Draloch wrote above me, you can assign shortcuts (in addition to the default 1, 2, 3 etc..) via the preferences window. At the bottom of the window, you have two tabs: "game" and "key bindings". clicking on that tab will let you map specific actions and quickbars to shortcuts (that's why I mentioned "ALT + 1" above for the "Force kick")

Edited by Oggthebase
Link to comment
Share on other sites

×
×
  • Create New...