You will be able to open on them even with 30 stacks. Just as you said before...if you are dueling an assassin and you he pops his stealth detection and you are behind him...he still cant see you. We do it all the time in duels. This should be no different. I'm sure the sniper is going to have to at least be semi looking in the way you are approaching. If not, then its broken and should be fixed. If it is what I think it is, it will be fine. It will just require you to not hump their faces.

i suspect there are some modifiers to whether the stealther is in the face or behind. but i cannot tell anything about the math behind it.

i suspect there are some modifiers to whether the stealther is in the face or behind. but i cannot tell anything about the math behind it.

No one knows the math behind it...but it exsists. Believe me, I have done hundreds of duels with assassins and tests with sneak and such. If the assassin pops his stealth detection and I have not popped sneak, I can still stand behind him without him detecting me. I beleive this will be the same with your cover mechanci. The only thing it changes (bare in mind, all my thoughts because I am at work) is your frontal cone view. It is a huge buff for snipers in that regard but I dont think it is as bad as a nerf to operatives as many people suspect. Also because...who cares if you dont get the hidden strike opener..roll towards him if he sees you while takin 30% less damage and then fight him. We didnt need our opener to beat snipers before, and we wont need it now. IMO

I think the opener is quite important still. But judging by the your statements, the +30 detection if it is conal, then there is absolutely nothing for stealthers to worry about.

It is important yes, but just think. If you do happen to get caught, it will take roughly 1 second to get into battle with the roll, if you are lucky, it procs evasion which will either cleanse if you are fighting lethality making him use another global, or cause a snipe/ambush to potentially miss...if nothing else its 1 global. I dunno, I just dont see it as that big of a deal, I could be completely wrong though. Needless to say I am a little excited.

Concealment got slightly buffed, my Hidden Strike now crits for 187.000 points of damage

Jokes and bolstering bugs aside, it feels like they actually did a lot of good things to all of our specs. Can't really test it right now, since 800k hp vanguards explode you with 50k flameballs and such, but I think once the dust settles and warzones are actual warzones again (and no testing grounds for strategic sized fusion bombs on two legs, in the form of powertechs and sentinels), we might actually be in a nice place.

Concealment got slightly buffed, my Hidden Strike now crits for 187.000 points of damage

 

Jokes and bolstering bugs aside, it feels like they actually did a lot of good things to all of our specs. Can't really test it right now, since 800k hp vanguards explode you with 50k flameballs and such, but I think once the dust settles and warzones are actual warzones again (and no testing grounds for strategic sized fusion bombs on two legs, in the form of powertechs and sentinels), we might actually be in a nice place.

oh lawdy!!!! with lvl 55 gear or regular lvl 50 current gear?

I'm using the level 55 stuff, but it really doesn't matter. The point is that certain spec patterns glitch the game and cause you to gain absurd amounts of crit, surge, power, cunning and stamina. This will be fixed, I can't see us onehitting basically everything except operation bosses

pve gear or pvp gear?

That doesn't matter at all. You get something like 29.000 expertise and 60.000 cunning due to the bugging bolster mechanic. those one or two thousand points some piece of gear might add are completely insignificant. Sentinels are killing everything in sight with 70k dual saber throws, without equipping any gear at all.

well damn. I saw a video of that earlier. No pvp for me I guess til they fix that.

As I see it, only the energy regeneration is fixed. The dps will not be improved at all because Hidden Strike still requires stealth and Backstab has the same CD. Plus, other classes get stealth detection, immunity, reflect and more goodies. I was waiting to see a decent fix but I think they will not give us. At least they told us the future class 'balance'. For me its time to move on from this game. No reason to wait any more or pay for this 'balanced' expansion...

Even not counting the changes to Alacrity and power regen, one change in particular is a direct increase to damage. Lacerate + Collateral Strikes is now much better through traits. Collateral Strikes procs 70% of the time now, and is no longer rate limited to once every 10 seconds. That's a pretty nice boost to DPS.

Better Energy management should help DPS as well, if only because we'll be able to use more attacks without running into energy issues. I know I can frequently become energy starved if I'm not very careful.

Yes, the increased proc chance for Collateral plus removing the internal cool down should be very nice for both damage output and energy management. Cutting the cost of Backstab by 10 instead of 5 will help as well. It should also be easier to stay on target as Concealment. I like...can't wait to download the PTS and see how it plays.

I'm also looking forward to Lethality. It's not as much as I hoped for but Fatality, plus no longer needing to spend TA on Stim Boost, should help things flow better for Lethality. I just hope Toxic Regulators is really any sleep effect and not just ours. Our DOTs not ticking on any mezzed/asleep target would be a huge boon to this tree.

From my testing experience, Yes they removed the internal cool down on collateral strikes, but they still kept the cool down on re granting Tactical advantage. The problem is actually Alacrity now itself. Stock Enforcers gear with one power and one crit implant, I ended up having to rifle shoot more so than normal while waiting on shiv to come up to lacerate again. My alacrity rating is at 5.09% with full stock enforcers gear, and our 2% alacrity talent (which is in my opinion mandatory now).

The lethality problem that has been plaguing us since day 1 (bad tactical advantage generation) is still there, and I do not know if alacrity effects the dot ticks, but I do know that Corrosive Grenade was ticking for the same amount of non crit damage as it does on live with 100+ more power.

We'll see if it gets fixed in some of the later patches but it just seems to me that our already clunky rotation is even MORE clunky.. but hey, at least we can beat Ursain Bolt in a 40 yard dash now

Stealth Detection - Stealth level = distance from where the sniper can spot you, but still he has to target and shoot at you to pop you out of stealth.

 

He has 30 stacks. You pop sneak, also talent +5 stealth from concealment (is it +5 now??). Come into 15m range from the sniper with 30 stacks. If you come closer, he will spot you. instead you scamper/exfiltrate 12m towards him, then immediately use hidden strike.

 

Theoretically if he has some crazy *** reactions he should be able to knock you back, but more often than not you will be able to safely open on the sniper regardless. You only dont have to mess up with the distance from where you scamper/exfiltrate towards him.

 

If you dont have +5 stealth talent taken, you are pretty much screwed. If you dont have sneaka available you cannot open on him. If you you have neither of these, you should never walk within the range of a sniper which has been sitting in cover for long enough. Especially as a healer or a sin tank, you will be spotted quite often if you are too close and careless.

 

Oh and stealth detection has a buff icon, you can see how many stacks he has by targeting the sniper.

 

See Ilmarinen how much i am doing for you, so that you could kill me?

Note that any move will auto select closest valid target if no target is selected at all, so a sniper could just spam rifle shots and as soon as the operative becomes target able he could pop him out.

Also note the environment, in CW for example, you could use the east and west "Stage" porch thingy to los the sniper. He'd hear your stealth detection thingy but he couldn't target you unless he moved which would, alas, remove the stacks. Otherwise, since the porch is barely 12 m if that from one side to mid you could go up the side and gank his left or ride side, which ever is closer.

Stealth detect is not simple as people are saying it is.

Stealth detect in front is VERY different from behind. Works on 180 degree front and back.

There was a formula somewhere on the web but it's not one level = 1m calculation at all. Also, it seems the way stealth is calculated has changed. I have not tested this because PTS character copy blows chunks but I would wager that with the +5 points into both advanced stealth and sneak with the roll you can get behind a sniper/slinger no problem.

I have a feeling the reason they put this skill in place is to probably to stop the stealth node guards. You can have two stealth hold a node for a very long time by just popping in and out of stealth and CC'd etc.

Stealth detect is not simple as people are saying it is.

 

Stealth detect in front is VERY different from behind. Works on 180 degree front and back.

 

There was a formula somewhere on the web but it's not one level = 1m calculation at all. Also, it seems the way stealth is calculated has changed. I have not tested this because PTS character copy blows chunks but I would wager that with the +5 points into both advanced stealth and sneak with the roll you can get behind a sniper/slinger no problem.

 

I have a feeling the reason they put this skill in place is to probably to stop the stealth node guards. You can have two stealth hold a node for a very long time by just popping in and out of stealth and CC'd etc.

Too bad it took everyone a whole year to figure it out. Ragook Oozo was saying that any team of full stealthers (since they can heal and tank and dps) would be unstoppable in civil war.

looks promising, though when compared to the shadow/sin buffs, these buffs are kinda pitiful. Then factor in the improved sniper stealth detection, so we wont be able to ever approach them in stealth, and that net that wont let us get back into stealth...well, we'll see.

Where is the shadow/assassin buff? Darkness is still on the same lvl, Madness have been buffed a very little bit and Deception have been completely(at best) remodeled if not nerfed to the ground

I've officially trade marked

Rollin and Cullin™

To be my first lethality pvp video.

From my testing experience, Yes they removed the internal cool down on collateral strikes, but they still kept the cool down on re granting Tactical advantage.

Yeah the cooldown is still on tactical opportunity else you'd see chains of 6 lacerates in a row fairly commonly. But with cheaper lacerates and backstabs as well as higher energy regen overall you should have a much easier time setting up explosive probes and orb strikes without getting energy starved. Might even be a place for overload shot with spare energy.

Yeah the cooldown is still on tactical opportunity else you'd see chains of 6 lacerates in a row fairly commonly. But with cheaper lacerates and backstabs as well as higher energy regen overall you should have a much easier time setting up explosive probes and orb strikes without getting energy starved. Might even be a place for overload shot with spare energy.

Explosive Probe is a lot more powerful now too. I was seeing it hit as hard as Hidden Strike.

Explosive Probe is a lot more powerful now too. I was seeing it hit as hard as Hidden Strike.

you mean it wasn't hitting that hard before for you guys? I think the highest I got with probe was 5.3k, it's easily comparable to backstab now.

you mean it wasn't hitting that hard before for you guys? I think the highest I got with probe was 5.3k, it's easily comparable to backstab now.

No, not typically. Best I see on Live is around 3.5k.

No, not typically. Best I see on Live is around 3.5k.

are you using it when acid blade is up? if not you should rethink your rotation slightly. My usual Probe is a 4k crit to 4.5.