I have been playing since launch and for the first time since january I am trying out the imperial side. Haveing read these forums I went for the Imperial Agent Sniper because of it's apparant awesomeness:)

 

now on Balmorra I get killed by just about every mob outthere (and if the 1st mob doesn't kill me the 2nd one will when Kaliyo pulls it in before I'm healed up again )

 

I have just played a gunslinger on the rep side with little problem and the sniper is suposed to be the mirror of that, so why is the sniper so much weaker when it comes to survivabillity? Is there some secret to this class that I'm not aware of

 

If so please tell me so I can enjoy imperial side too

 

sdust

I have a 50 sniper and never really noticed the issues you are mentioning (couple of rare cases aside). Help us understand the situation, what spec are you (Marksman, Engineering, Lethality), link to your build preferably? What kind of gear do you have? Also are there specific types of mobs that are giving you trouble? Finally what is your rotation / priority?

I leveled as a marksman sniper till 40ish when I switched to engineering

 

Make sure your Tank in our case Kaliyo is decently geared, modible with blue mods. I usually had her tank the harder mob, while I took out the easier ones.

 

Rotation usually resulted in, the 100% crit chance buff on snipe, instant snipe from entering cover, follow through, which resulted in dead easy mob. Switch to other one with ambush now at 1.5 seconds from the marksman tree talent, then help out Kaliyo with either Series of Shots or another snipe to begin the rotation again. Putting in explosive Probe when available.

 

Might have to heal a little bit after each set but it was the simplest leveling build. Engineering is more fun, set Kaliyo/Scorpio on champion target, throw on interrogation probe and plasma probe, switch to the easier mob, series of shots, take down, then ambush on the other, then move back to the champion mob.

I'm only level 18 and my spec is 5/3/1 (steady shot 2; marksmanship 3; gearhead 3; Lethality 1)

 

My rotation is something like this:

frag greanade/ explo. probe

ambush

corrosive dart

snipe, snipe, snpie etc.

takedown

 

+ shiv if they get close enough and that "foe's begone" skill I have (cant remember it's name)

 

my gear is mostly (30+) greens (belt and knife is due an upgrade soon)

Chest and rifle is (46)

I do not yet have an implant or a relic

 

My stats is:

 

263 pres

256 cun

219 end

 

I do not really buy items on GTN unless it's been too long since i've had a specific item drop (This have worked fine for me on my rep charaters, so it should work on imp side aswell) At 3rd planet my gear and companion gear shouldn't be THAT much of an issue anyway...

 

sdust

Personally since I had the Collectors edition, I went and bought the Imp trooper set from the social items vendor in the VIP lounge. And my sniper is cybertech so I filled him with blue/purple mods I made, bought bracers, belt modable on the GTN for cheap (9k each).

 

Had an artificer and an armstech so always in mods, and made sure Kaliyo was in modable gear. Pvp's so I had the level 40 tank set for bounty hunters for her.

I'm only level 18 and my spec is 5/3/1 (steady shot 2; marksmanship 3; gearhead 3; Lethality 1)

 

My rotation is something like this:

frag greanade/ explo. probe

ambush

corrosive dart

snipe, snipe, snpie etc.

takedown

 

+ shiv if they get close enough and that "foe's begone" skill I have (cant remember it's name)

 

At level 18 you don't have all the nice skills yet, but here is what I'd do if I were in your place (soon will be on a gunslinger). First since you are a bit scattered on your skills, and leaning toward marksman, put all your points into it for now. Specifically I would get Marksmanship, Steady Shots, Ballistic Dampers and Precision. You could of course move some points from Precision and Ballistic Dampers to Gearhead or possibly Energy Tanks if you have an energy regen issue. The main reason behind this is that you won't benefit at this point from the crit chance in Lethality. This is of course my opinion, YMMV.

 

As for your rotation:

explosive probe, snipe, (ambush if proc'd), snipe, (takedown), snipe....etc. Throw in frag grenade and debilitate / shiv as needed when they close in.

 

I have found that I never really used corrosive dart except on elites (long dot and not worth the energy IMO unless you are specced to Lethality). As long as your gear and Kaliyo's is up to par, you should be ok. The trick I found at those levels was to enter cover...line up all your channeled skills where you can hit quick and hard, not giving any mobs a real chance to respond. Best of luck to you.

At least you'll get your healer on Taris rather than Hoth. Both pretty late, but slingers have it worse.

Personally, I don't understand how you DO die as a sniper. Ambush crit=insta dead mob (for anything less than a silver) and a non-ambush crit is still generally enough to follow up with an auto attack for the kill. Then two snipes will finish most everything else off. Sitting on a 31 sniper, full marksman so far. Literally never died due to mobs, unless you count when running through tunnels, pulling everything.

I think the main error is if you start with frag grenade... the mob won't have time to target Kaliyo before all coming to you...

 

Explosive Probe is a better option as it only targets 1, or just start with Ambush... the charging up is basically "free" as long as they aren't aggroing you first.

 

As a sniper, try to avoid attacking the mob all at once, unless they're a few levels under you.

 

also take cover behind objects if you can, the "Cover" can save you a LOT of HP...

 

*that's pretty much the only way I can solo some of the champions... or else, I can't heal fast enough*

Try going patron instead of skill, maybe, but I didn't have this problem. I suspect it's a gear issue. You should have a fair amount of orange gear by this point and the rest blue. Your companion should be similarly geared. Everything should be up to date or within a level of that. If your characters aren't crafting, they should be. You'll save yourself a ton of money and create a source of income, as well.

 

I use crouch in place for cover, not taking cover behind stuff. Always take some kind of cover. Not only are most of your abilities tied to it, but you're a lot less squishy.

 

Edit: whoops I missed your response post. This is what happens when I come to the forum before coffee. I agree with the above poster who suggested that you go straightup marksman for now. There's a lot of interdependence in those abilities and it absolutely rocks. It's lethal and surprisingly tough for a medium armor class. Once you get used to the class,you can leave stuff out and put them elsewhere, depending on your play style. I ended up taking crit buffs and the like from other trees and leaving out some of the defensive stuff because I found I didn't use it or need it. Left out the top marksmanship ability because the animation annoyed me. And I was so freaking deadly, it was unnecessary.

Edited November 14, 2012 by errant_knight

Keybind Kaliyos attack and send her in first to get aggro, then you can do your thing

As a sniper you should be able to solo easily and faster than most classes. Our weakness is that we are a bit squishy and can struggle on long fights such as against a Champion level mob. On trash fights we dominate.

 

You should always be in cover and open a fight with Ambush. The casting time is effectively zero if its all out of combat.

 

Kill enemies from weakest to strongest. This usually means opening against a normal mob. Depending on how much damage the ambush does follow with the quickest/cheapest ability that will kill the mob. Sometimes this is a simple basic attack and sometimes it's a snipe. If there are surrounding mobs it might also be a frag grenade. If it takes you 3 shots to kill most regular mobs you may need a better gun barrel. Ambush/snipe and later ambush/followthrough should kill one enemy.

 

Once the first guy is down move to the next weakest. Consider using explosive probe or snipe. Use whatever abilities will kill the enemy fastest and with the least amount of global cooldowns.

 

The strongest enemy should be last. Only use corrosive dart on elites or higher. If they die in under 15 seconds you won't get the full benefit.

 

If enemies get too close be prepared to debilitate and once you are able follow that up with a headshot or the other attack that requires a stunned opponent. Bind these somewhere where you can react quickly. Shiv is also good to finish off an enemy that is too close because it is instant.

 

Eventually cover pulse will be useful to keep stuff off you as well.

 

Finally, as others have mentioned, stick to one skill tree until you max it out. In marksman for instance you want to hurry and get followthrough. Nothing is worth delaying that.

Sounds like a gear issue, and also a rotation and priority issue.

 

Buy all orange modifiable gear- head,chest,legs, gloves, boots, belt, bracer. Plus you want a modifiable main and off hand weapon.

 

Gear to all blue mods of even level- upgrade every 2 lvls for armorings - no exceptions. Purple armorings are even better, but no need early on when you level fast, maybe switch to purples in your 40s, but ALWAYS blue quality or better. always.

 

Upgrade mods/enhancements every 3-4 levels following the same rules as above. These are a little less important than your armorings while leveling up, but this is where you get your crit% surge% and accuracy% buffs.

 

Barrels should be purple artifact quality at all times for pure DPS classes like sniper/gunslinger. your barrel is the most important mod you have (especially for gunslinger where you need 2) ------these determine your damage.

 

Clean up your rotation as outlined in the posts above- spec marksman early on and use the abilities that sync with your talents.

 

Clean up your priority targeting by concentrating on weak/normal/silver/gold in that order while letting your tank companion hold the strongest mobs while you burn through weakest first. Use your crowd controls- disable droids, use stun grenades, etc.

 

Gear your companion as if it were your character. Pick one (tank) and gear it up as I outlined above. you can stick to blue mods for your companion- but make sure the armorings are up to date so they can absorb damage while you kill.

 

good luck, have fun.

First, Snipers are a DPS class, and as such they have it easier than tanks or healers, really. You can run with a DPS companion for regular and even silver mobs, and switch to Kalyio or Dr. Lokin for bosses, makes things faster.

 

First things first: the melee skills. You have a melee stun, a small damage, and a big-damage-only-when-stunned. Guess what? Wait for one mob to get into melee, then melee stun, damage, bigdamage, then push them back (regular mobs die by the time you push them back, bosses don't, but still you keep them stunned for a bit, which prevents their damage).

 

Otherwise, you'll mostly be using the ranged skills. Use the probes and the shatter shots to debuff the enemy, and then lay into them with damage. Applying all the probes and debuffs uses up energy, so once you're done you want to shoot the energy-free shot (to recover some) and then switch to the high-power shots to kill them off.

 

Always start with Ambush, it's a long activation skill. I usually do Ambush+ShatterShot as the opening combo, followed by the probes and then the damage shots till dead.

 

For talents, out of the Engineering tree you absolutely want: Interrogation Probe (it's a good DoT), and all the improvements to Explosive Probe, esp. the Cluster Bombs. Cluster Bombs are amazing, anyone's shots suddenly take out huge chunks of HP from the target's bar when the bombs are active. Finally, you also want the Instant Snipe.

 

Out of the Marksmanship tree you want:

- to make Ambush ignore armor (you usually open with it, so it's used before you can debuff the armor).

- Ballistic Dampers so that when you start the fight the enemy response is ignored for a while (this is awesome, as most enemies open up with their biggest, nastiest damage first, and also Kalyio hasn't had a chance to taunt yet).

- the other Instant Snipe

- Followthrough - it's a free, instant, huge damage shot that works awesomely with Ambush and all the instant Snipes you've been getting.

 

And, don't forget to use your defenses and ranged stuns. They are critical for interrupting big-damage abilities. You see the boss cast bar going, you MUST interrupt it.

Edited November 15, 2012 by Merouk

I would recommend you put your points:

 

Cover Screen 2, Steady Shots 2; Marksmanship 1

Ballistic Dampers 2; Precision Ambush 2

 

Send Kaliyo in, then open up with Explosive Probe, Ambush. Snipe when needed. Use Frag Grenade as a quick knockdown on the weak mobs. Things should die fairly quickly even with questing gear. That's been my experience so far.

 

Edit: Also, don't be shy about using Debilitate, Cover Pulse, and the ranged mez (I forgot the name).

Edited November 15, 2012 by SerowTOR

Personally since I had the Collectors edition, I went and bought the Imp trooper set from the social items vendor in the VIP lounge. And my sniper is cybertech so I filled him with blue/purple mods I made, bought bracers, belt modable on the GTN for cheap (9k each).

 

Had an artificer and an armstech so always in mods, and made sure Kaliyo was in modable gear. Pvp's so I had the level 40 tank set for bounty hunters for her.

 

I tried having moddable gear on me AND my companion, but i couldn't find any crafters that weren't greedy a**holes, i believe in paying for what the item costs to make and a little extra as tip, though crafters tend to demand tips, even though tips are technically optional, but demanding them and still calling them tips is just stupid.

 

I really wish i liked crafting, but i don't, i HATE crafting, every mmo has crafting and every single mmo, i have hated the crafting in it, the most i tend to do when trying crafting is just make green armor and sticking with that, the crafted green armor tends to be more superior to what you get via quests, sometimes even the blue gear is worse then crafted greens, but the gathering the gear tends to get more and more long-winded, especially when there are 2 grade 1s and grade 2s and so on, why can't there just be one of each grade, it would be so much more manageable.

 

For example, instead of Desh, Silica and Laminoid and Aluminium, it could just be desh and silica.....would be so much better that way.

I never die as my sniper (lvl20) except if I get sloppy on a champion that has support.

 

It looks to me like your rotation is not that great. I always enter cover and open with ambush (laze target buff first if it's up) that plus a snipe kills pretty much any normal mob I face plenty of them are taken down by just the ambush. Then I just spam snipe till everything is dead or ambush is up again. If the mobs are clustered around my companion I'll toss off a frag grenade and hit cover pulse if 1-2 are melee and run up on me (Kaliyo usually keeps them off me though)

iu have a lvl 50 sniper and never had this problem at all ......nothing that 4 tick's of orbital strike carnt fix

as thats about too land use you buffs for a great crit strike or 5 not alot live's after that apaprt from gold's sometimes