Started a Sith Assassin, loving it (possibly more than my Marauder), wanting to focus more on using the saber over force abilities, while still liking the ability to have a force ability

 

Trying to be melee dps with as much survival as I can manage, more worried about PvE, PvP is more for fun than trying to be the best, so would like to do best in PvE. Should I just stick with Deception build with some points in Darkness?

Well if you want more melee and less force and seeing as you get a tank companion right off the bat I would stick with deception its probably the best leveling spec and imho my fav at level 50.

I run deception for PVE endgame operations. For TFB hardmode 16, on the puzzle boss and TFB itself I am consistently topping MoX over our marauders and powertechs IF i don't eff up my rotation for force regen. Other fights like the dread guard i usually stick around 3rd come phase 2 and 3 since the bosses move around so much, and with 16 folks its hard to see my positioning and often times i loose some dps since im not positioned correctly for maul.

 

Builds you can run for end game ops deception:

 

Chain shock: http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#2000MZfMrRkfbRroZf0c.2

 

Electric Execution: http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#200bc0MZfMrRkfbRroZc.2

 

Lately i've been dropping obfuscation in favor of putting points in Resourcefulness for the lowered cooldown on overcharge saber. Simply because it is a dps gain with it being on time with recklesness (both of which i used to open a fight).

 

Best way to start, stealth - recklnessness + overcharge saber - discharge (for that crit and thus melee damage increase crit chance) then your VS X 2 (then most likely maul explit will be up), maul, shock, VS etc..

 

for force regen, after your initial burst phase you can hit black out for force regen, when that 6 second window is done - give or take a few seconds, force cloak to reset, keep dps'n 6-10 seconds later hit blackout again, then you have 45 seconds where you have to use saber strike a bit before black out comes off cool down.

 

As for stats, I have played around with crit rating and power rating so much - this has to be the toughest class to maximize stats that i've played. There exists very little information for PVE deception.

 

A few days ago I had around 997 force power with around 39.9 melee crit and 38.9 force crit with 76.7 crit multi...last night i tried with more power (63 power mods in my belt / bracers instead of crit). So i had around 1025 force power and around 37 melee crit and 35 force crit. Definitely noticed less crits with shock / maul, but they hit harder.

 

Ive also been playing around with the new dread guard relics since they are passive power stats on them now...been trying a proc relic and the on use power one in combination with my war hero power etc...

What stance would be best to use with a mostly melee build? Lightning Surge or Charge Surge?

Deception uses Surging Charge, Madness uses Lightning charge, Darkness uses Dark Charge

Been looking for a good build. Think I will go with that chain shock build nosmos. Thx. Edited November 25, 2012 by Ryat

Np, also I've been parsing with this build: http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#2000cZfMrRkfbRroZf0M.2

 

which basically only puts 2 points in chain shock and 3 in armor pen - seems to work out nice. As well, people might want to consider switching to the Dread Guard proc relic and on use power ones

So...I went to plan out my build. Did so. Then looked at others. Seems it matched up pretty closely to others. With the way the trees are setup, that just may be how it is.

 

So question becomes, how do I gain more Accuracy? Just gear that gives Accuracy? Do I want gear that gives Power or Defense Rating?

What'd I do if I wanted to have a build like in the progression trailer.

That build looked cool.

Np, also I've been parsing with this build: http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#2000cZfMrRkfbRroZf0M.2

 

which basically only puts 2 points in chain shock and 3 in armor pen - seems to work out nice. As well, people might want to consider switching to the Dread Guard proc relic and on use power ones

 

9% armor pen is about 1.3% extra damage. Definitely not worth 3 pnts.