My main's a sentinel and I think it's fine. Of course, mercs and snipers are OP, but I do all right against them. In spite of everyone's complaints, all classes are okay. Melee's tougher to play than it used to be, but if you know your class, and when to use which DCDs, you'll do fine. Mara's have a bit of a learning curve, but it'll come with time. GL

Mercs aren't OP. They aren't glass cannons anymore. The bad mercs are still bad and if you understand merc cooldowns you will have 0 issues killing them.

Hello fellow SWTOR players , thinking of getting back to game after a looong break (2015) seeing that player base is increased ETC , i am going to subscribe and do pvp only . When i stopped playing Sorc and Sin was good , what are the viable class' atm ? i am thiking of playing marauder. And what specs ? and why please..

I'm not sure that the player base has increased. I would say the opposite is true. It's just that the player base is more consolidated on a few servers (harbinger, red eclipse, ebon hawk), which only happened due to the overall decreasing population.

Expertise is gone. So gearing is a grind fest. Galactic Command is a mess, dropping RNG crates of mostly junk. I'm sure you've heard all that. You can gear via PvP only, but it's the slowest way to gear. SM operations drop 236 and HM drops 242. If you want to PvP only, you have to grind Unassembled Components at a slow rate, turn in a bunch of them for a single tier 1 piece, grind more components, turn them in + the tier 1 shell to get a tier 2 piece, etc.

Any Mara spec is viable in PvP. Carnage is probably the most popular. The problem you will have is that Mercs and Snipers are completely out of control right now. Since 5.0, Mercs have been everywhere. Arsenal has insane survival tools now, which make them far tankier than Juggs, while still maintaining high damage output at range. Snipers also have some great survival tools. I think it's engineering spec that is quite popular. They can drop an AOE slow all over the place, making life miserable for melee.

Current flavor of the month specs are: Arsenal Merc (these are everywhere), Snipers, Immortal Juggs in dps gear, Sorc healers.

Current fodder specs are: dps Juggs, AP or Pyro PT

Mediocre specs are: Mara (any spec), Merc heals, Sorc dps, Operative, Marksman Sniper, Assassin (any spec)

P.S. Ignore the obvious troll "MercenaryPlayer" (can the name get any more obvious ).

Hello fellow SWTOR players , thinking of getting back to game after a looong break (2015) seeing that player base is increased ETC , i am going to subscribe and do pvp only . When i stopped playing Sorc and Sin was good , what are the viable class' atm ? i am thiking of playing marauder. And what specs ? and why please..

Welcome back. Carnage and fury are top tier. Annihilation is okay.

Carnage has a 3 sec burst window every 12 sec and is probably the most durable of the three specs. Fury burst is on demand and has CC immunity. Annihilation is dot/spread. All thee have good survivability and strong damage.

Even though merc and snipers are a bit overturned, I have little issues with mercs and snipers only if there is more than 1 eng sniper in the match.

Trivia, mara seems to be strongest dps in team ranked, even though it is semi dead

thank you for your long reply , can i have some rotation tips about those two specs?

I advice Dulfy class guides. I play mainly combat sentinel. During the precision window you want to land your biggest hits, which are in damage order:

Devastating blast (DB).

Lance.

Dispatch.

Barrage.

Never use DB outside precision window. I try to use lance only in precision window. For the rest I am liberal on their use. I use dispatch on CD if I need focus, though probably not the smartest thing. If Zen is available (or about to be) you can delay it to the next precision window so you land all your three biggest hitters in one window. If all three critic you can deal in the neighborhood of 65K damage in 3 seconds. DB is auto critic and lance guaranteed every 60 secs, so it is pretty common.

Mercs aren't OP. They aren't glass cannons anymore. The bad mercs are still bad and if you understand merc cooldowns you will have 0 issues killing them.

mate with all due respect there is absolutely nothing true in wath you said, they were never a glass canon sorcs were, and before 5.0 the class required actually skill now any Muppet can play one, you heal to full 3 times and that is not overpower? learn their mechanics? like wath kiting? as if that is possible i understand you are having a blast on owning people with your overlord class now and dont want to lose that but merc and snipers are a cursed cancer in pvp now and certain 90% of playerbase agree on that except mercs ofc (an op class wont ever admit is op ever )but that wont last forever at some point you will have to be tune down not before next lv cap am certain so enjoy while you can

What???

What???

is any lie at all? but for tread effect all specs are viable just combat/carnage need an adjustment gore/lance imo should be 1 point energy less or be affected by zen/berserk. outside is ok

Mercs aren't OP. They aren't glass cannons anymore. The bad mercs are still bad and if you understand merc cooldowns you will have 0 issues killing them.

I can't think of a time when I have heard a bigger crock of shyt.

Had you said something to the effect that there are tactics you can try to help minimize the heals a merc will get if you hit them during certain of their DCDs or certain other classes will have an easier or more difficult time of it against a merc [melee vs. ranged], that would be one thing and I'd of not taken your post as anything other than other people who deny it's OPness. But to say that if you understand their cooldowns all classes will have 0 issues kill them is literally the single stupidest thing I have ever heard a human being utter so blatantly and matter of factly. - - - While the strategy of stop attacking a merc when they have their sheild up may prevent them from getting the heals that the shield can provide if they are hit, it fails to acknowledge the slight side of effect of that strategy gives the merc total damage immunity for the duration of the sheild while at the same time giving them carte blance' to blow your face of for it's duration. Given the slight prevelence for mercs in wzs, you're not gonna have enough CCs to match their uses of such abilities given comparisons in CDs. Merc's plethora of CCs allows them much more opportunity of them controlling you than you them [save for assy's and operatives].

Mercs are, without question, not only OP, they are insanely OP. They may well be the worst example of an OP class this game has ever seen. Worse than Sorcs were pre-nerf 4.0 and worse than smash monkeys.

What makes mercs so egregiously worse than former FOTM, or perhaps better said, OP classes [there can be a differences plausably] is that they have absolutely no weaknesses. They are a walking Trinity all in one. They have strong DPS [even if not the strongest], they are better tanks as a DPS spec than a PT Tank, and thier heals are SO insanely ridiculous it defies reason that any DPS spec should have the potential for that level of healing.

Now, here's the kicker. Given your name [Mercenary Player], it's probably fair to say that you are not the most reliably impartial source for judging the state of mercs currently. You'd have to have a level of intelligence nearing that of dog [and a dumb dog at that] to not see your comment for the totally self serving load of crap that it is.

Heavy Armor [with the added damage reduction that comes with it]

Self Heals

A passive self heal of 70% of their total health

Godly DCDs

Damage Reflect that a Jugg would kill for. [with it's side benefits]

CCs out the azz

Utility that gives them the option of having a massive increase in health comparatively

Ranged superiority that is inherent to all ranged classes compared to melee.

Rotational slows.

Somebody who literally just started playing for the first time might believe that crap, but the only other person your comment is fooling is yourself.

Man up. Call a spade a spade like countless other mercs have. That is at least respectable. Acknowledging it's state does not diminish it's use. You look like an idiot with that statement.

I can't think of a time when I have heard a bigger crock of shyt.

 

Had you said something to the effect that there are tactics you can try to help minimize the heals a merc will get if you hit them during certain of their DCDs or certain other classes will have an easier or more difficult time of it against a merc [melee vs. ranged], that would be one thing and I'd of not taken your post as anything other than other people who deny it's OPness. But to say that if you understand their cooldowns all classes will have 0 issues kill them is literally the single stupidest thing I have ever heard a human being utter so blatantly and matter of factly. - - - While the strategy of stop attacking a merc when they have their sheild up may prevent them from getting the heals that the shield can provide if they are hit, it fails to acknowledge the slight side of effect of that strategy gives the merc total damage immunity for the duration of the sheild while at the same time giving them carte blance' to blow your face of for it's duration. Given the slight prevelence for mercs in wzs, you're not gonna have enough CCs to match their uses of such abilities given comparisons in CDs. Merc's plethora of CCs allows them much more opportunity of them controlling you than you them [save for assy's and operatives].

 

Mercs are, without question, not only OP, they are insanely OP. The worst example of an OP class this game has ever seen. Worse than Sorcs were pre-nerf 4.0 and worse than smash monkeys.

 

What makes mercs so egregiously worse than former FOTM, or perhaps better said, OP classes [there can be a differences plausably] is that they have absolutely no weaknesses. They are a walking Trinity all in one. They have strong DPS [even if not the strongest], they are better tanks as a DPS spec than a PT Tank, and thier heals are SO insanely ridiculous it defies reason that any DPS spec should have the potential for that level of healing.

 

Now, here's the kicker. Given your name [Mercenary Player], it's probably fair to say that you are not the most reliably impartial source for judging the state of mercs currently. You'd have to have a level of intelligence nearing that of dog [and a dumb dog at that] to not see your comment for the totally self serving load of crap that it is.

 

Heavy Armor [with the added damage reduction that comes with it]

Self Heals

A passive self heal of 70% of their total health

Godly DCDs

Damage Reflect that a Jugg would kill for. [with it's side benefits]

CCs out the azz

Utility that gives them the option of having a massive increase in health comparatively

Ranged superiority that is inherent to all ranged classes compared to melee.

 

Somebody who literally just started playing for the first time might believe that crap, but the only other person your comment is fooling is yourself.

 

Man up. Call a spade a spade like countless other mercs have. That is at least respectable. Acknowledging it's state does not diminish it's use. You look like an idiot with that statement.

Just because some had a hard time in past then they think they have all the right and more then fair to be on this ridiculous state:D

Anni/Watchman will be out any combat and fury in the right hands. You have to have a mastery of DCDs and more keybinds to accomplish this. Also you need to know to use off skills, which ones to use, and in what order to really do damage.

Their easy mutiple bleed dot spread fluffs their numbers. They may be able to get the bigger total damage, but for one on one killing potential and big hit numbers, combat has it on watchman. Combat has superior TTK [time to kill] potential. Watchman is alot more respectable with regard to DPS that counts in PVE and raiding in particular because it provides for the rampup time the spec needs in order to dish out the slight DPS edge they have on combat. PVP simply doesn't allow for that kind of ramp up time. The single target damage it does in a longer fighter is meaningful damage. The damage it does in dot spreading in PVP is all fluff and accounts for a sizeable chunk of it's overall total damage. If you were to use watchman in a single target manner like Combat or Fury in PVP, they'd likely come in last DPS wise compared to the other two specs or possibly second after combat.

I'm not denigrating Watchman/Anni mind you. It's very good, it's damage just isn't as meaningful in PVP as it is in PVE due to it's high fluff damage totals from dot spreads. You can't even really compare it to the AOE of combat [which can without question fluff numbers] because combat's aoe you have to actually physically hit an enemy with your sabers and it's damage stops when out of range, which is not the case with a dot spread.

It's like when you see a Sorc come in first place in DPS at the end of the WZ, the total is nice, sure, but it's mostly from dot spreading which is less meaningful damage for PVP.

It's also fair to note that Watchman/Anni brings a very good group utility to a match by way of small group wide heals, which also increase it's personal survivability. It's the only one of the three specs that has an innate ability to heal. I'd say that is a strong benefit to any team.

You can argue the procs and cons of each spec, but at the end of the day, they are all good, they are all more than capable of messing up someone's entire world, and they each have their own little nitche'. In PVP, you really can't go wrong with any of them.

mate with all due respect there is absolutely nothing true in wath you said, they were never a glass canon sorcs were, and before 5.0 the class required actually skill now any Muppet can play one, you heal to full 3 times and that is not overpower? learn their mechanics? like wath kiting? as if that is possible i understand you are having a blast on owning people with your overlord class now and dont want to lose that but merc and snipers are a cursed cancer in pvp now and certain 90% of playerbase agree on that except mercs ofc (an op class wont ever admit is op ever )but that wont last forever at some point you will have to be tune down not before next lv cap am certain so enjoy while you can

^

Well said.

Their easy mutiple bleed dot spread fluffs their numbers. They may be able to get the bigger total damage, but for one on one killing potential and big hit numbers, combat has it on watchman. Combat has superior TTK [time to kill] potential. Watchman is alot more respectable with regard to DPS that counts in PVE and raiding in particular because it provides for the rampup time the spec needs in order to dish out the slight DPS edge they have on combat. PVP simply doesn't allow for that kind of ramp up time. The single target damage it does in a longer fighter is meaningful damage. The damage it does in dot spreading in PVP is all fluff and accounts for a sizeable chunk of it's overall total damage. If you were to use watchman in a single target manner like Combat or Fury in PVP, they'd likely come in last DPS wise compared to the other two specs or possibly second after combat.

 

I'm not denigrating Watchman/Anni mind you. It's very good, it's damage just isn't as meaningful in PVP as it is in PVE due to it's high fluff damage totals from dot spreads. You can't even really compare it to the AOE of combat [which can without question fluff numbers] because combat's aoe you have to actually physically hit an enemy with your sabers and it's damage stops when out of range, which is not the case with a dot spread.

 

It's like when you see a Sorc come in first place in DPS at the end of the WZ, the total is nice, sure, but it's mostly from dot spreading which is less meaningful damage for PVP.

 

It's also fair to note that Watchman/Anni brings a very good group utility to a match by way of small group wide heals, which also increase it's personal survivability. It's the only one of the three specs that has an innate ability to heal. I'd say that is a strong benefit to any team.

 

You can argue the procs and cons of each spec, but at the end of the day, they are all good, they are all more than capable of messing up someone's entire world, and they each have their own little nitche'. In PVP, you really can't go wrong with any of them.

TTK is not an issue as Watchman now that leap is out of the rotation just make sure you use snare. Problem with combat is it is too focus starved and predictable. Old combat did pressure outside of PS window, but now you have to focus on building focus and relieve that pressure that used to exist. Also, I play Watchman as single target in PvP, always do high numbers without the fluff, but more importantly I get kills. Where the real meat of watchman and skill comes from what skills you use when you got your all your dots up and MS is on CD. Watchman uses by far more keybinds in PvP than combat and will require dedication to learn to perform right. Combat is a bit simpler but still takes talent to learn.

As someone who has been playing Sentinel since launch (missed founder title by 1 month), I can say, yes, all three are viable and strong. My only point was to not limit new players to thinking that they can only be effective if they are combat or fury. When played right, watchman can 1v1 any class, 1v2 most classes all the while putting up meaningful damage and kills.

TTK is not an issue as Watchman now that leap is out of the rotation just make sure you use snare. Problem with combat is it is too focus starved and predictable. Old combat did pressure outside of PS window, but now you have to focus on building focus and relieve that pressure that used to exist. Also, I play Watchman as single target in PvP, always do high numbers without the fluff, but more importantly I get kills. Where the real meat of watchman and skill comes from what skills you use when you got your all your dots up and MS is on CD. Watchman uses by far more keybinds in PvP than combat and will require dedication to learn to perform right. Combat is a bit simpler but still takes talent to learn.

 

As someone who has been playing Sentinel since launch (missed founder title by 1 month), I can say, yes, all three are viable and strong. My only point was to not limit new players to thinking that they can only be effective if they are combat or fury. When played right, watchman can 1v1 any class, 1v2 most classes all the while putting up meaningful damage and kills.

Definitely some fair points.

As good as combatcan be, it is as you said, predicable with regard to it's ferocity window and can be easily shut down by a perceptive opponent. It's greatest strength [massive burst windows and the ability to do a ton of damage really fast] is also it's greatest weakness. You shut down it's windows effectively, it is not a style of play that is forgiving of that happening too often, nor is it forgiving of mistakes in rotation/priority.

That said, it does have surprisingly good sustained damage.

Your point of pointing out that all three specs can be extremely effective, and are worthy of consideration is an important one and I totally agree with you.

Hello fellow SWTOR players , thinking of getting back to game after a looong break (2015) seeing that player base is increased ETC , i am going to subscribe and do pvp only . When i stopped playing Sorc and Sin was good , what are the viable class' atm ? i am thiking of playing marauder. And what specs ? and why please..

IMO if you want to play Mara in the current meta with Mercs and to a lesser extent snipers about, both of which some people have issues 🙄, then Fury it the way to go. They are extremely effective against snipers and with some tactics you can be your teams sniper killer. Mercs are also good to focus on a Mara. If you make it your mission to take those guys on for your team (who will love you) and leave the rest of the classes to them, then Fury is the way to go,

It your goal is to just top the DPS then Carnage will give you bigger numbers but requires a lot more up time on the target and that can make it more difficult to stay on snipers. Fury is also the easiest of the 3 specs to play casually, but just as hard to really master.

As usual it comes down to preferred play style and goals. Play what ever feels the most comfortable for you

mate with all due respect there is absolutely nothing true in wath you said, they were never a glass canon sorcs were, and before 5.0 the class required actually skill now any Muppet can play one, you heal to full 3 times and that is not overpower? learn their mechanics? like wath kiting? as if that is possible i understand you are having a blast on owning people with your overlord class now and dont want to lose that but merc and snipers are a cursed cancer in pvp now and certain 90% of playerbase agree on that except mercs ofc (an op class wont ever admit is op ever )but that wont last forever at some point you will have to be tune down not before next lv cap am certain so enjoy while you can

I'm op