SWTOR Jedi Shadow Comprehensive Guide

SWTOR Jedi Shadow Comprehensive Guide by AstralFire

INTRODUCTION

This guide is free for reproduction by others on any website, in part or in whole, under the following terms: a link to this guide’s official location on the official swtor.com forums is provided, and access to the guide does not require or imply a need for payment of any kind from the end user. I do not require (but do appreciate!) being told when you have mirrored my guide. A previous version of the guide, suitable for offline viewing and printing, is hosted on my website thanks to the efforts of Timberley in editing it for the PDF format. Follow this link to get the PDF version. Alternate language versions of the guide have been started by independent people who have told me that they will give me a link back when it’s done.

This handbook is intended to be a comprehensive guide to gameplay competency with the Jedi Shadow. As such, it will provide data on effective Player-versus-Player gameplay, Player-versus-Environment gameplay, and some general tips on leveling as a Jedi Shadow. It is not intended to be a walkthrough or guide to any specific World, Flashpoint or Operation, and will only contain some brief looks at specific Warzones and Conflict Regions. Skill Calculator builds are merely my opinion, and though I do my best to learn as much as possible, I cannot know everything. If you have contradictory ideas, please post them here. While this guide will never be perfect, it will be more perfect with each version than the last. We get better through sharing ideas, after all.

This guide will also go over the basics of gearing as a Jedi Shadow, and highlight some notable pieces of equipment.

The version numbering will correspond with that of the most recent live version of the game, followed by a letter indicating a major revision to the guide’s contents. e.g. 1.0.1c would be the third major version of the guide intended to correspond to game version 1.0.1. Minor wording changes and stylistic editing will not be considered.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

01. [Introduction]
02. [Table of Contents]
03. [Shadow Basics]
04. [Specialization: Kinetic Combat]
05. [Specialization: Infiltration]
06. [Specialization: Balance]
07. [Shadow Companions]
08. [Equipping a Shadow]
09. [Crew Skills]
10. [Appendix: FAQs]
11. [Appendix: MMO Glossary]
12. [Appendix: Keybinds]
13. [Appendix: Shadow Assassin Dictionary]

SHADOW BASICS

Parent Class: Jedi Consular
Mirrored by: Sith Assassin
Primary Weapon: Double-bladed Lightsaber, Electrostaff
Off-Hand Items: Shield Generator, Force Focus
Armor Class: Light
Aesthetic Inspirations: Darth Maul, Exar Kun, Satele Shan, Bastila Shan
Story Inspiration: Obi-Wan Kenobi. “We wanted to capture the journey of Obi-Wan Kenobi – someone who begins with unusual insight and talent, but who is still growing into those powers.”
Skill Trees: Kinetic Combat (Defender), Infiltration (Melee Striker), Balance (Hybrid Striker)
Resource: Force Points. (Base Max: 100; Base Recovery: 8 Pts/Second)
Playable Species: Human, Miraluka, Mirialan, Twi’lek, Zabrak
Voice Actress: Athena Karkanis
Voice Actor: Nolan North
Key Playskills: Understanding your three ranges (4m, 10m, 30m), predicting energy cost and healing needs.

The Jedi Shadow does not fear wasting her Force Points early in a fight; she has few long cooldowns, and a steadily refilling resource bar. Unlike Smugglers and Troopers, this resource bar does not regenerate at variable rates. The challenge in playing a Jedi Shadow correctly is careful management of several short-term cooldowns and interspersing low or no-cost abilities with medium and high cost abilities, to avoid missing a vital window of opportunity.
careful balancing of your basic attack – which requires no Force to use – versus your more costly abilities is essential to success. While many of your abilities have very short or non-existent cooldowns, spamming a low-cost ability whenever available will prevent you from making effective use of the higher cost abilities.

The Shadow can access up to three different combat stances, or techniques, which alter the majority of her relevant abilities. Each of these stances adds a chance to affect each of her melee attacks (though no more often than once every 1.5 seconds). Melee attacks which hit multiple times or multiple targets have a better chance of activating the technique once per ability. These stances are off of the global cooldown, but have a high resource cost. It is possible to switch techniques and then immediately benefit from the change, but you can do so only with careful forethought and planning, and at the expense of restricting yourself heavily for several seconds prior.

While these techniques are active, the Shadow is able to use the ability Force Breach, which has a variable effect based on which technique is active. When Combat Technique is active, Breach becomes an AoE strike that debuffs the opponents’ accuracy by 5%. Force Technique creates a periodic damage effect Breach, and Shadow Technique delivers a sharp burst of damage via Breach.

Generally speaking, the Shadow is very comfortable with Melee to Short-Range play. In proper specs, the class appears to be the least kiteable melee and an excellent kiter due to high mobility options, snares, knockbacks, Force Pull, and ranged abilities. You’ll always be at your very best in Melee Range, but if someone goes out to 5 meters and farther, you are still doing very reasonable until they get to 11 meters. A completely successful escape from a properly built Shadow is nearly impossible, as should be expected from their archetype.

People familiar with Rogues from World of Warcraft will find only some similarities in the Shadow. For the most part, it is far more survivable with fewer hard controls (such as stuns) and more range as well as self-healing. While it will always be optimal for Shadows to attack from behind, it is by no means expected or necessary for any but an Infiltrator.

Generally speaking, stealth is more difficult than in other games. Stealth detection is a bit easier for your targets when you get close in, which is why you get the Blackout ability. It’s a pretty neat little ability that greatly improves your stealth level for a brief window of time, with a one minute cooldown. When you absolutely have to get in close for a Mind Maze, use Blackout and get in and out of there fast.

At level 15, you get the ability Channel the Force, which is the power-up music ability for the Jedi Shadow and Jedi Sage. Channel the Force has a 20 minute cooldown and lasts for 1 minute; it is extremely powerful, and can allow you to solo otherwise impossible challenges. At a minimum, let me say that you should make certain that you have this ability before embarking on the mission Ancient Secrets in Coruscant. It will be very handy towards the end of that mission.

Mass Mind Control and Mind Control are great abilities in PvP, and should not be forgotten. Unlike Guard, they do not require you to be in Combat Technique, so any Shadow can make use of it; clever use can severely reduce the output of someone attacking an ally. Pair it well with Force Cloak and Force Wave and other abilities to keep them from immediately beating up on you, however.

KINETIC COMBAT

Playstyle: High threat, proactive self-healing defender; melee with some ranged moves.
Technique: Combat Technique
PvE Builds: Standard (31/0/10), Balance Variant (25/0/16)
PvP Builds: PvP Harnessed Shadows (27/14/0), Hybrid Balance (23/0/18), Hybrid Stealth (22/19/0), Earthbender (22/12/7)

Priority List:

0. Saber Strike (Out of Force)
1. Kinetic Ward (1 charge or about to expire)
2. Force Breach (Every time it’s up)
3. Slow Time (5 seconds after cooldown ends) or Force in Balance (every CD)
4. Telekinetic Throw (3 stacks of Harnessed Shadows)
5. Spinning Strike (Target at 30% health or less)
6. Mind Crush (Force Strike buff)
7. Project (Particle Acceleration buff) or Whirling Blow (2 or more enemies)
8. Double Strike

This priority list holds even single-target, as Slow Time and Force Breach have useful side effects, and Force in Balance is good damage for the FP cost.

Welcome to our tanking tree. The Kinetic Shadow is the most offense-oriented of the three tank styles available in the Old Republic. We possess a mix of battlefield control, mobility and range that makes the playstyle a blast. The bulk of its survivability is defined by its high blocking chance, while it has moderate avoidance, stable mitigation, and the unique ability among tanks to self-heal. Though its armor seems initially low, Combat Technique and several of its specialized skill brings the class armor values on par with the Jedi Guardian, and it has superior damage reduction for Elemental and Internal damage, the two types not covered by armor.

The heal granted by Combat Technique’s passive bonus is minor, and typically functions more like mitigation than damage; you won’t even notice your health crawl up. However, Battle Readiness can be modified into an instant self-heal as well as greatly improving the healing generated by this passive.

In addition to the unique ability to self-heal, the Kinetic Shadow is easily the highest damage of any defender specialization in the game, tied with the Darkness Assassin. AoE threat is not an issue after obtaining your primary area attack, Whirling Blow, and as awkward as ranged tanking can be in PvE, the Shadow still handles these situations with more aplomb than the Guardian ever can hope to.

Personally speaking, I found the default User Interface to be lacking as a Kinetic Shadow tank; most of my time is spent checking the lower bar to watch multiple cooldowns, expiring buffs, whether or not Particle Acceleration had activated, the range of a selected target, as well as estimating how much of my Force Points I had remaining in order to execute the next move. This is not good, as ranged tanking – which the Shadow will be doing a lot of – is very complicated. Fun, but complicated. Some of these issues will go with time; as you get into a steady rhythm, you won’t have to look at the bar so often to predict how soon you can use your next attack.

Of note: Force Potency and Particle Acceleration don’t get used up by Project until after Project hits the target. This can be problematic if you launch the attack at the last second… but it can also be to your benefit, allowing you to cast Project first and then cast Force Potency immediately after.

PVE

There are two builds presently available for Jedi Shadows in Player-versus-Environment content: the Standard (31/0/10), and the Balance Variant (25/0/16). The Standard will likely prove superior to the Balance Variant for difficult group content, due to the psuedo-mitigation provided by Slow Time, as well as the additional 12% healing provided by Telekinetic Throw through Harnessed Shadows. Note that the first 6% of the heal, along with half of the damage, occurs during the very first second of the ability; if you have to move, your Telekinetic Throw will not be wasted, and the ability does significant damage. Even so, the Balance Variant has significant benefits which should be discussed.

Most notably, ranged tanking is a pain. The Standard only has one ability at greater than 10m range: Force Pull. Force Pull is not a move that you use to start a fight, that is what stealth is for. Instead, Force Pull is to allow you to bring one enemy closer so that you can use your death spam AoEs easier. If you have multiple enemies wielding ranged attacks, however, this can prove inadequate; this is not a game that often allows for the ‘pull around a corner’ strategy tanks would use to deal with this in the past, due to slightly smarter enemy AI. It is true that Force Potency has a (clumsy) range increase built into it for Telekinetic Throw, but your Telekinetic Throw can be easily interrupted. Even if you have Harnessed Shadows up, the power is still cancelled by movement, and you can only do this twice every 90 seconds; it is not an adequate solution.

This is where the Balance Variant comes in. Force in Balance is a location-targeted AoE attack with a 30m range, that also comes with the benefit of moderate self-healing. While it is limited in the number of targets that it can affect, at 3, Whirling Blow is quite spammable. Additionally, even within the 10m range, the variant is considerably more capable; Force Strike allows Mind Crush to avoid both of the difficulties of using Project: the delayed activation time and the high Force cost.

Of note, the Balance Variant build is extremely close to the PvP version of the same build, and you can do an alright job tanking with the PvP version, as it picks up an extra 30m stun in return for a minimal loss in self-healing.

PVP

As a warning note, if you’re planning on PvPing at low levels, I recommend doing it as Infiltration. Kinetic and Balance suck before 20, and respecialization is cheap your first several times.

Player-versus-Player on a tank is different in this game than in World of Warcraft, which you may be accustomed to. Mind Control and Mass Mind Control are your taunts; when used, they reduce the target’s outgoing damage by 30% for 6 seconds unless they attack you. Useful tools to prevent incoming damage on an ally, and you usually do not have to worry about an immediate backlash, because it’s nearly impossible to point out who delivered the taunt. Guarding is another story – Guarding allows you to share your HP pool with another player, which subjects you to taking more impact from Area of Effect abilities, but can make killing your partner an absolute pain. Due to a Kinetic Shadow’s unique ability to break slowing effects with Force Speed, Kinetic Shadows make good partners for a huttball carrier – they can Guard the target, push and pull enemies into firewalls and off ledges, and also run the ball very effectively themselves.

Unique to the Shadow is the ability to both Guard a target and hide in stealth until attacked, allowing them to perform an effective defender duo with a healer, or part of an offensive ninja trio on enemy objectives in Alderaan and Voidstar. It’s always advisable to open in stealth if possible, in order to Mind Maze potential targets.

Another peculiar strength of the Kinetic Shadow in PvP is the ability to use Spinning Kick out of Stealth. This may seem like a mediocre ability – it’s a 2s stun, and induces a 1.5s global cooldown. Well, think again. It is actually a knockdown, and not an incapacitate effect. There is no ability in the game which can break someone out of a knockdown – they have to recover normally. While it is a tricky ability to use, a well-timed Spinning Kick is guarantee of 2 seconds where there is absolutely nothing the target can do, no matter what, as long as their resolve bar is not overcharged.

As you may’ve noticed, the questionable PvP value of the top of this tree has led to a lot of potential different builds. Widely stated, the many builds are splintered around these key points: Harnessed Shadows, Force Slow, Circling Shadows, Find Weakness, Upheaval, Force in Balance, Containment and Force Strike. There are many notable skills in each of these PvP builds, but those are the most central ones.

Harnessed Shadows (go to the PvE segment for a quick look at it) is cumbersome to properly build up, but results in an extremely high spike damage/slow/self-heal that is one of the ultimate expressions of force power, and it is only ever paired with Circling Shadows for easier Project activations. Knowing when to save a Harnessed Shadows in conjunction with Force Potency can be crucial to victory. Force Slow allows the Kinetic to be a more effective harasser, especially against an opponent with cleanse support. Circling Shadows makes casting Project a simpler task, requiring less prediction, and improves the burst off of Find Weakness. Find Weakness sharply raises your burst output; a single Shadow Strike under its effect can deal double the damage of your Double Strike, even moreso under a critical.

Due to the weakness of Guarding a target and then having you both get blasted by AoEs, it may be advisable for a defensively-playing Hybrid Stealth to drop the two points in Subduing Techniques or Fade and opt instead for Kinetic Field, which reduces your incoming AoE damage by 30%. It’s ordinarily not worth it at all, but as many AoE attacks in the game are balanced around hitting two or more targets (rather than three or more), Kinetic Field can prevent you from dropping too fast.

Upheaval randomly improves the burst off of Project a significant amount, and Force in Balance allows you to finish off runners or break multiple capture attempts simultaneously in a Warzone. Containment pairs with Force in Balance as an answer to runners, allowing the short-ranged Kinetic Shadow to control enemies on a whim, at the cost of filling their resolve bar. Finally, Force Strike in a Kinetic build partially makes up for the awkwardness associated with using Project without Circling Shadows by adding a second source of 10m range burst damage, this one free of cost, though with backloaded periodic damage.

GEARING

As with all Consulars, Willpower is your primary stat, and you use both physical and Force abilities, so you would rather take the Power statistic rather than Force Power. Alacrity will increase the speed of your Telekinetic Throws, but it is not something you should try to do; it has no other benefit to you. You will obviously want to build up defensive statistics – Absorption, Shield Rating, Defense and Endurance. Absorption and Shield Rating will provide the biggest bang for your buck. The hardcap on bonus for Shield Rating is around +50% chance – you’ll experience diminishing returns well before then, but it gives you a wide margin to reach for.

This is important, because the Jedi Shadow has the least amount of survivability cooldowns relative to other specs, but has a significant advantage in how often it shields, thanks to Kinetic Ward. (Note also that a shielded attack cannot be a critical. This could mean that the Kinetic Shadow is vulnerable to auto-crit abilities, or could also theoretically reduce the critical chance of a received attack, if the chance is not 100% but the sum of shield chance + critical chance is greater than 100%.)

Because Kinetic Ward has a limited number of charges available, a higher avoidance chance will increase its longevity, as well. Therefore, the type of encounters we face will direct the next most important survivability statistic. If we constantly see high-end content with multiple enemies which require tanking, there will be a strong lean – a higher avoidance chance will reduce the number of charges eaten up on Kinetic Ward, improving your AoE tankability. If, instead, the Shadow is constantly facing a limited number of attacks, armor and absorption rating will take precedence.

Endurance is of low priority at current itemization schemes, because the endurance multiplier in the Kinetic Combat tree is so low.

Offensively, the Kinetic Shadow wants Surge Rating, to take full advantage of auto-critical Projects. Critical Strike rating should be a non-priority for gearing.

In PvP, Expertise Rating will be your single most important statistic. Accuracy Rating will also come into consideration; while you previously could only miss with your basic Saber Strike attack, every class has a minimum of 5% defense, and tanks can have much more. I would strongly consider getting at least 10% accuracy, to make sure that you do not miss with a vital Crowd Control or interrupt against enemy Jedi Sages and Sith Sorcerers, who have a base defense of 10%.

INFILTRATION SHADOWS

Playstyle: Spike damage striker, harasser; melee skirmisher.
Technique: Shadow Technique
PvE Builds: Armor Piercing (5/33/3), Upheaval (2/31/8)
PvP Builds: PvP Standard (5/33/3), PvP Upheaval (0/33/8), Variant (11/30/0), High Regen Backstab Spam (18/23/0)

Priority List:

0. Saber Strike (Out of Force)
1. Spinning Strike (Target at 30% health or less)
2. Shadow Strike (Find Weakness buff about to expire, behind target)
3. Whirling Blow (3 or more enemies)
4. Force Breach (Every Cooldown)
5. Project (2x Circling Shadows buff… so near basically every CD)
6. Shadow Strike (Find Weakness just proc’d)
7. Clairvoyant Strike or Double Strike

Infiltration is the most martially-based of the three Shadow trees, eventually becoming extremely flashy as a melee combatant. It’s the tree the Shadow was built for, and thus levels the most effectively of any Shadow tree early on; where the other trees are grasping for their basics before level 20, the Infiltrator already has most of what he needs. It also is unique, as it is the only spec among all 24 Republic specializations that has no good 30m offensive abilities, and essentially, no method of gap closing beyond Force Speed. In return, it has the most effective control while it is on a target, and the highest damage of any Shadow specialization. The basic conceit of the tree is that you use your martial strikes with a lightsaber to either buy time for your powerful, Force-driven attacks; or that you use those abilities to get into position for a particularly vicious Lightsaber stab in the back.

Since Shadow Technique has a chance to activate on each hit, even though it’s capped at a maximum of 1 activation per 1.5s, all of your multiple hit moves get more benefit from Shadow Technique than it appears. Shadow Technique would apparently do similar average damage as Force Technique, right? About double the damage and half the activation rate? Think again. Your main two abilities strike twice every period. The chance of at least one activating Force Technique is 75%, which is a 50% relative increase from the base activation chance of 50%. However, the chance of at least one activating Shadow Technique is 44%, which is a 75% relative increase from the base activation chance of 25%. This difference becomes even more distinct with Saber Strike, which has a 58% chance to activate Shadow Technique, and an 88% chance to activate Force Technique – relative increases of 130% and 76% respectively.

Incidentally, this means that if you follow the pattern Clairvoyant Strike, Clairvoyant Strike, Project, you will only reliably have one charge of Exit Strategy saved up. Exit Strategy charges gain very slowly. You’d need six or seven full cycles to get a stack of five with high certainty – that’s around 30 seconds, and Force Breach will be up every 12 to 15 seconds. Some math will have to be done versus reliable gear levels, to show what the optimum amount of Exit Strategy stacks is to release in a maximum DPS cycle. My suspicion is that Exit Strategy should be simply considered a bonus rather than a need in a maximum DPS cycle, and that Force Breach should only be held back, waiting for a full stack, when in burst damage phases.

Force Wave and Project deserve special mention with this tree; their secondary effects are useful to allow you time to go behind the target and stab it. Force Wave’s knockback can even pull this off in PvP; don’t expect that effect from Project in harder PvE or any PvP, however.

PVE

In Player versus Environment content, the Armor Piercing (5/33/3) damage rotation is pretty evident. As with Kinetic Combat, it is a very erratic priority list, as the key of the tree has you watching your rotation. The Infiltration Shadow is surprisingly good at Area of Effect damage for a single-target specialist, but only in bursts; while it still has the awesome Whirling Blow, the Infiltrator can most efficiently use it when just coming out of stealth, or under the effect of Blackout. For those of you playing along at home, in a group situation, the Infiltrator can get 18 consecutive seconds of vicious, vicious AoE slashy goodness: coming out of stealth, blackout, Force Cloak.

When not being a whirling dervish, the Infiltrator still hits really, really hard. Starting out, you’ll find that you like to stab people in the back. It’s not as necessary as you think, though. Without the Find Weakness buff which comes from your other attacks, Shadow Strike typically does not do enough damage for its crippling Force Cost versus the combination of Clairvoyant or Double Strike followed by a Project. Even under the effects of Shadow’s Respite, you’ll only regenerate enough Force Points for another full-cost Shadow Strike about every third GCD.

Kinetic Field is not a strictly necessary skill, but it is an advisable one for group content due to the prevalence of PvE splash damage. The 2 points in Kinetic Field, Fade, Situational Awareness or Celerity can be moved to any of the slots as you see fit.

The Upheaval (2/31/8) build has recently been brought to my attention, and on targets which have less armor (below about 20% armor), it looks like it may overtake the Armor Piercing build (which has been renamed from Standard for that reason). This is pending on how much armor reduction enemies are calculated with on average.

PVP

The PvP Standard (5/33/3) is pretty fun, and also startlingly close to the PvE version of said build.

People keep asking me about openers. Allow me to stress that unlike Rogues and similar classes from other games, there is not a specific opener or set of abilities which can be recommended. Not only has BioWare taken pains to avoid ‘out-of-stealth alpha strike’, but there aren’t even a lot of options. Here are the basics:

– You open up with a Shadow Strike, which hits hard and – as a single one – does not put too much of a strain on your regeneration since you’re coming out of stealth with 110 FP and a high regeneration.
– You open up with a Spinning Kick, which is a knockdown (not a stun, and therefore cannot be escaped by a cooldown) for 2s. Not advisable unless you really, really need the person to not be doing something for two seconds and none of these alternatives are suitable:

– Mind Snap costs no Force, does not use a Global Cooldown, and for you it has a fast cooldown of its own. And it also doesn’t increase the resolve bar, which Spinning Kick does.
– Mind Maze uses a lot of Force, causes a lot of resolve bar cost, and can’t be used if your opponent is already in combat/isn’t advisable if you want to engage them in combat. It’s a great CC, however.
– Low Slash can be escaped, does damage, costs the same amount of Force, but has a 15s CD. You will probably want this for later.
– Force Stun has a 30m range, can be escaped, has a long CD. You probably want this for later.

– You open up with a Clairvoyant Strike, which does good damage, and sets up your chains early.

That’s really it. There’s no great complexity here. I’d go with Shadow Strike or Clairvoyant Strike for most situations personally, but that’s me.

That aside, you will want to keep Force Slow on your target at all times, using it every cooldown or close to it. Once the person is out of your 10m grasp, they are out of your reach forever. That’s it. Though you may be interested in frying a runner every now and then by using Telekinetic Throw with Potency, as it gets 30m reach under the effects of Potency, and does good damage under its effects, as each tick will benefit from the 60% added chance to crit.

Force Breach’s damage may seem to be a bit low relative to Project’s; remember that Force Breach deals internal damage, which bypasses armor entirely, and typically only tanks have a resistance to internal damage. It’s also on a separate cooldown from Project, which means that it can be fired in quick succession, while Project has to contend with its internal cooldown.

For example, a Shadow ready to torch his opponent at low health can use the combination of Force Potency, Spinning Strike, Project, Force Breach, Low Slash, Shadow Strike, Spinning Strike in rapid succession, a combination which is nearly impossible to survive.

Of note is that even though you’re not a tank, you can still use Mind Control, your taunt, which reduces the outgoing damage of the taunted foe by 30% unless they attack you – this is a great addition to teamplay dynamics, because it is entirely possible for you to use Mass Mind Control when everyone is beating on your healer or huttball carrier, and then using Force Cloak to vanish into nothingness.

The PvP Upheaval (0/33/8) build is the most notable alternative; it trades off more damage on every single attack that you do (by losing the armor penetration of Technique Mastery in Kinetic Combat) for a larger burst out of Upheaval. It may even be better in PvE than the standard, due to the way Project scales, though I would not be willing to put money on it without a combat log handy.

There are two other alternative builds: Variant (11/30/0) and High Regen Backstab Spam (18/23/0). Variant works exactly the same as normal, but gives up a lot of its burst for better motion. Your mileage may vary, I don’t personally recommend it.

Neither do I recommend High Regen Backstab Spam, which is pretty much exactly what it sounds like – it gives up a lot of its burst for the ability to shank someone really, really sithing hard. A lot. Under the effects of Shadow’s Respite, you’re regenerating 15.6 FP/s, which means that in a teamplay situation, where someone else can keep the guy from paying too much attention, you’ll get a few more Shadow Strikes. To elaborate on why this isn’t worth it – roughly speaking, Shadow Strike is only half as efficient at damage as Project and Double Strike in this specialization, at least when Find Weakness isn’t active. You’ll run out of Force far too quickly for the energy difference to likely do its job. I don’t think it will last long enough to deliver its damage, but as I don’t claim to be a PvP god, I’ve included it for the sake of information.

GEARING

As with all Consulars, Willpower is your primary stat, and you use both physical and Force abilities, so you would rather take the Power statistic rather than Force Power. You do not need Alacrity as none of your abilities of note have cast-times. Critical Strike Rating is your single most important statistic, as your critical hits with Shadow Strike, Force Breach, and Project do significantly more than the base +50%. While Surge Rating is also nice, you flat-out crave critical strike more than anything else until diminishing returns kicks in hard, because you have no method of ensuring critical strikes to keep Force Synergy up aside from Force Potency.

Surge Rating is still valuable as well, because the built-in diminishing returns on Surge do not account for your flat bonuses to critical from your specialized skills. You can easily sport another +20% critical strike damage from gear.

In PvP, Expertise Rating will be your single most important statistic. Accuracy Rating will also come into consideration; while you previously could only miss with your basic Saber Strike attack, every class has a minimum of 5% defense, and tanks can have much more. I would strongly consider getting at least 10% accuracy, to make sure that you do not miss with a vital Crowd Control or interrupt against enemy Jedi Sages and Sith Sorcerers, who have a base defense of 10%.

BALANCE SHADOWS

Playstyle: Periodic damage, self-healing; versatile range.
Technique: Force Technique
PvE Builds: Standard (7/3/31)
PvP Builds: Standard (3/7/31)

Priority List:

0. Saber Strike (Out of Force)
1. Force in Balance (Even single target, every CD)
2. Telekinetic Throw (Under Force Potency)
3. Project (If Twin Disciplines is not active, or about to expire)
4. Spinning Strike (Target at 30% health or less)
5. Shadow Strike (Find Weakness, behind target)
6. Mind Crush (Force Strike buff, preferentially on an unafflicted target)
7. Sever Force (On a target not currently afflicted, or about to expire)
8. Force Breach
9. Telekinetic Throw (if you need healing or are low on Force)
10. Double Strike or Whirling Blow

The Balance Shadow is the only Melee/Range hybrid out of all six Jedi specializations; obviously, Madness Assassins hold the same distinction among their kin. It’s notable for being the only type of Jedi Shadow that doesn’t want to hurl a big rock or piece of scrap metal at someone every single possible cooldown; as you can see, it uses the largest range of completely unique skills as part of its damage rotation. Telekinetic Throw’s status as a periodic damage spell is currently in debate.

PVE

There’s not too much to say or watch out for here that the priority list doesn’t already cover.

Standard (7/3/31) has been altered from previous builds, because my assessment is that Force Breach is simply not used enough on multiple targets in most situations to make a faster cooldown worth it, versus a bonus to the critical melee skill of Double Strike. The basic idea behind the Balance playstyle is to drop Force in Balance on your target and go to town with periodic damage effects. On a single target, its damage is less relative to Infiltration, though decent; on multiple sustained targets, the damage can rack up quickly.

Abuse the fact that Force in Balance and Sever Force have full 30m ranges rather than 10m, and consider switching targets early in a group situation. Likewise, abuse your instant cast Force Lifts as well as the fact that you get a stun if someone is damaged while contained within them; Force Lift is normally risky to use mid-fight in PvE because it will heal the opponent, but if you Force Lift a multiply DoTted opponent, it is unlikely a heal pulse will get off, making it an effective interrupt.

There is an alternative version of this build for leveling that takes two points out of Expertise and into Pinning Resolve, which lets your Force Lift affect two additional targets. It’s of no use in PvP or endgame PvE, but can be very nice for managing large crowds while soloing.

PVP

As a warning note, if you’re planning on PvPing at low levels, I recommend doing it as Infiltration. Kinetic and Balance suck before 20, and respecialization is cheap your first several times.

Standard (3/7/31) is standard. There’s really not much to say here, honestly, given the currently undeveloped state of the metagame, making it difficult to speak of specific counters.

The biggest thing to note is that Sever Force can be a great way to nail someone who thinks that they’ve just gotten out of your range, for a minimal resolve cost; you can save it if you suspect that someone is going to flee in short order, or you can save it to backstab someone who’s gotten low, then chain into a Force Stun or Force Lift to stab them some more..

Of note is that even though you’re not a tank, you can still use Mind Control, your taunt, which reduces the outgoing damage of the taunted foe by 30% unless they attack you – this is a great addition to teamplay dynamics, because it is entirely possible for you to use Mass Mind Control when everyone is beating on your healer or huttball carrier, and then using Force Cloak to vanish into nothingness. You can even get away with using Combat Technique rather than Force Technique in order to Guard your ally, as you have a wealth of self-healing available. Guarding allows you and your ally to share a health pool, which is a fantastic way to help keep them alive; 50% of their damage intake gets redirected to you as long as you remain within 15 meters. It’s not recommended for large periods of time as you are not a tank and your self-healing goes down without the ability to Force Breach someone with a DoT, but you’re more capable of it than Infiltration Shadows, so take advantage of it from time to time.

You’re going to take the role of a Pressure Player; though you have burst, it’s significantly less than that available to the other two Shadow trees, so you are unlikely to get the burst damage necessary to down someone quickly. Mind Crush is significantly weaker than Project for direct damage, and your Projects lack the power of Kinetic and Infiltration. You don’t have the force regeneration of Kinetic, or the efficiency in burst of Infiltration – but your DoTs are extremely efficient, and you have the hardest hitting Double Strike of any Shadow.

GEARING

As with all Consulars, Willpower is your primary stat, and you use both physical and Force abilities, so you would rather take the Power statistic rather than Force Power. Critical Strike Rating is your single most important statistic, as your critical hits with Double Strike, Force in Balance, and all periodic damage abilities do significantly more than the base +50%. Alacrity will increase the speed at which your periodic damage takes effect, making it a useful ability in PvE for straight up damage, but only up to a point, due to the limited charges that Force Suppression leaves.

There’s a geometric progression on keeping Force Synergy up with a higher critical chance; more Force criticals lead to more melee criticals lead to instant cast Mind Crushes which increases the chance that you’ll get a critical from at least one of your Force attacks. The more targets you can fight simultaneously, the easier it will be to maintain Force Synergy. And all of this says nothing of the benefit to your health regeneration.

Surge Rating is extremely valuable as well, because the built-in diminishing returns on Surge do not account for your flat bonuses to critical from your specialized skills. You can easily sport another +20% critical strike damage from gear.

In PvP, Expertise Rating will be your single most important statistic. Accuracy Rating will also come into consideration; while you previously could only miss with your basic Saber Strike attack, every class has a minimum of 5% defense, and tanks can have much more. I would strongly consider getting at least 10% accuracy, to make sure that you do not miss with a vital Crowd Control or interrupt against enemy Jedi Sages and Sith Sorcerers, who have a base defense of 10%. Finally, Alacrity will be much more important since it will improve the rate at which you get health return, and ensuring that periodic damage takes effect quicker prior to being cleansed by enemy healer.

SHADOW COMPANIONS

To assist you in your missions, you’ll build a small team of helpers over time. While they will remain with you regardless of how you treat them, making sure that they like you is important; a companion who likes and respects you will craft faster and perform skill missions more successfully. To avoid accidental spoilers, each companion is listed in a dropdown beneath their planet.

TYTHON

CORUSCANT

NAR SHADDAA

BALMORRA

HOTH

BELSAVIS

SECRET COMPANION

EQUIPPING A SHADOW

Handling your way across your starter world of Tython as a Jedi Consular should be pretty simple, for the most part. However, your masters and lessons do not really explain a lot about gearing, and I feel that it is useful to have a reference list available here. If you’re looking for specific gearing instructions per specialization, look back at the final paragraph for each specialization instead. This is general information.

All characters use one primary ability score of Aim, Cunning, Strength or Willpower. All four of these abilities has a specialized purpose. Aim will only increase your ranged damage and critical chance, Cunning will only increase your tech damage and critical chance, Strength will only increase your melee damage and critical chance, and Willpower will only increase your Force damage and critical chance. Normally, anyway.

Each base class has a different primary ability score. A primary ability score equally improves both of the damage vectors which your class will use. Through the Force, all things are possible; Willpower is the primary score for Consulars and Inquisitors, and grants both Melee Damage and Force Damage, as a result.

Presence measures your ability to inspire, lead, and guide your companions. A higher presence score will increase your companion’s health, damage and healing. Companions take up the party slot of a player, but are less effective than a player; if you intend to do a lot of content which requires full or nearly full groups, it’s not wise to invest much into presence.

Endurance, simply enough, improves one’s raw health.

Secondary stats are available, which add more complexity to the matter.

Absorption Rating: Increases the amount of damage blocked by a successful shield reaction. More rating is required to achieve the same percentage bonus at higher character levels.

Accuracy Rating: Grants additional hit, and then reduces the opponent’s defense once past 100%. More rating is required to achieve the same percentage bonus at higher character levels.

Alacrity Rating: A secondary stat which improves the speed of activation time for non-instant abilities. It does not affect the Global Cooldown for instant abilities. More rating is required to achieve the same percentage bonus at higher character levels. It may also increase the rate at which periodic abilities take effect.

Critical Rating: Improves the chance of a critical hit. More rating is required to achieve the same percentage bonus at higher character levels.

Defense Rating: Improves the chance of a avoiding an attack. More rating is required to achieve the same percentage bonus at higher character levels.

Expertise Rating: Increases damage and healing done, and reduces damage taken, but only in PvP. A maximum of 10% effectiveness. More rating is required to achieve the same percentage bonus at higher character levels.

Force Power: A secondary stat which improves Force Ability damage and healing only.

Power: A secondary stat which improves damage and healing from all sources.

Shield Rating: Increases the chance that a shield reaction is triggered against an attack. More rating is required to achieve the same percentage bonus at higher character levels.

Surge Rating: Improves the effect of a critical hit. Base Surge is +50%. More rating is required to achieve the same percentage bonus at higher character levels.

Tech Power: A secondary stat which improves Tech Ability damage and healing only.

CREW SKILLS

Money can get you everything.

Those of you coming from World of Warcraft post-Classic are familiar with the skill layout of that game, where every single craft skill had to have a mechanically advantageous thing that it ‘owned’ (each of them being roughly as good as the others). Several of the crafting skills in that game effectively were worthless to anyone besides the wielder, to boot.

That is not how this game works, mechanically. Every single crew skill mechanical perk originates from the fact that you’re getting the benefit cheaper or earlier than someone who does not have your craft skill. For example, anyone can use medpacks; only a Biochem producer can get a reusable medpack, which costs more to craft but will never get used up. You do not need to be an artificer to upgrade your lightsaber; artificers make the upgrades, you just buy them and insert them into the lightsaber yourself. Etc. The other thing is that all of the crafting skills have some sort of aesthetic option which is unique to them, and these are among the rare bind-on-pickup items that cannot be given to anyone else.

Therefore, there are three approaches to take when choosing your Crew Skill layout: Do I want to get something that will save me money on a reusable I want a lot of, do I want to get something that will make me a lot of money, or do I want to get something that will give me a unique visual perk? It cannot be stressed enough that crafting of any kind while leveling up will only be of limited use; you will always end up ahead in credits while leveling by not crafting anything. It becomes a question of time and money spent now, versus time and money spent later to either level up your own craft skill or constantly purchasing everything you need.

To make your decision, you need to have a good grasp of what can be made by each craft skill. You have access to three crew skills per character; a maximum of one may be a craft skill, and it’s recommended that the other two be a gathering skill and a mission skill which support that craft skill. Everything is oriented around the crafting skills; mission skills provide a nice little bit of flavor, but are essentially a second gathering skill oriented around the rarer materials that cannot be obtained through direct gathering.

It’s important to note that you will not automatically get all of the important recipes for Craft Skills from the skill itself, even by reverse-engineering; you will need to get some of these schematics from the Galactic Trade Network. It’s also important to note that you will always lose money by sending crew members to do missions, as the point is more to raise your skill and gain materials while not being out in the field yourself. If it was strictly superior to self-gathering, no one would ever do it.

I’ll go over each of the Crew Skills in brief – each section will contain the Crew Skill’s codex entry, followed by my input.

CRAFTING SKILLS
You may only have one of these skills on your character. If you take one of these, it is your most important skill. As noted above, once you get to endgame, you are not getting unique mechanical perks from what you make via these skills; you’re just getting it cheaper, easier, prettier, faster, or reusable. For leveling content, they do create some unique stuff for lower levels, so rich rerollers will make purchases from dedicated crafters a lot.

GATHERING SKILLS
Gathering skills are skills which you or your companion may employ in the field, when you see an appropriate resource. They supply the basic materials used in crafting skills. You may send your companions on gathering missions which cost money, but provide you with skill-point appropriate resources. There is a chance for your companion to fail when deployed on missions (I believe it is related to their affection), but it will always give you a skill point even if they fail. Out of your maximum of three crew skills, all three may be gathering skills.

MISSION SKILLS
Mission skills function identical to Gathering skills which cannot be personally collected; you need your companion to do them. They provide the rare resources used in crafting skills as well as providing a host of other benefits, such as giving you companion gifts to raise their affection, rare schematics, and sometimes rare equipment. Out of your maximum of three crew skills, all three may be mission skills.

If you read all that and are confused still – or didn’t read all of that, because it’s a lot to chew through, that’s okay. You just want the bottom line on which three crew skills I recommend, right? I’ve arranged them into sets of three based on what your main selling market is.

PvE Endgame: Biochem, Bioanalysis, Diplomacy.
PvP Endgame: Biochem, Bioanalysis, Diplomacy // Cybertech, Scavenging, Underworld Trading
Self-Leveling: Cybertech, Scavenging, Underworld Trading // Artifice, Archaeology, Treasure-Hunting // Synthweaving, Archaeology, Underworld Trading
Simple Money-Making: Pick any three: Slicing, Investigation, Diplomacy, Bioanalysis, Scavenging
Selling to Roleplayers: Armormech, Scavenging, Underworld Trading // Synthweaving, Archaeology, Underworld Trading // Artifice, Archaeology, Treasure-Hunting
Do not pick: Armstech

APPENDIX: FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Q: How do I become a Jedi Shadow?
A: Reach level 10 as a Jedi Consular, and find Master Ostar-Gal in the Republic Fleet or on Coruscant. He’ll give you a mission that will further your class training.

Q: I just became a Jedi Shadow. When do I get a Double-Bladed Lightsaber?
A: You should already have one. Look in your inventory for a bag item that contains a small starter kit full of things any growing Shadow needs. Be forewarned: The shield generator is useless (does not offer a shield chance) unless you are in your tanking stance, Combat Technique, which is not available until level 14.

Q: I just became a Jedi Shadow. Where do I train my Shadow skills?
A: Same trainer as your base class. Click the tab at the bottom to select your list of trainable Adv. Class abilities.

Q: Where can I respecialize my character?
A: There is a respecialization trainer standing in the banking area of Coruscant, as well as in the Class Trainer area of the Republic Fleet. In both locations, he’s a Rodian by the name of Leuro-Khian, and is titled as . He’s near the person who accepts Guild Charters.

Q: When can I get my speeder?
A: After turning level 25, purchase Speeder Piloting from your trainer for 25,000 credits, then go to your fleet. Barik, the Speeder Vendor, is located in the Northeast-most room in the fleet’s main deck. (Part of the Galactic Trade Market area.) You can also purchase them on Tatooine. Your first speeder will cost you 8,000 credits; you can get upgrades at level 40 and 50.

Q: I’m coming from WoW. Do these skill specializations have any resemblance to stuff from there?
A: The Kinetic Combat tree resembles Paladin or Bear tanking, loosely. Infiltration is somewhat similar to a Mutilate Rogue. Balance Shadow is a cross between an Affliction Warlock and an Enhancement Shaman. None of them are identical, but these should help to give you an idea of whether or not you’ll like the playstyles.

Q: I’m coming from Star Wars Galaxies/other MMO. Do these skill specializations have any resemblance to stuff from there?
A: I am not sufficiently familiar with most of those games to say. If someone would like to suggest things for me, I’d appreciate it. Games like City of Heroes are too different from your average MMO, and thus don’t really bear comparison well.

Q: Do I have to use a Double-Bladed Lightsaber?
A: If you want a lightsaber, yes. Not all of your abilities require it – most don’t, in fact. But your Techniques and Force Breach do, and every single spec relies heavily on its techniques. Sorry to break it to you. The Electrostaff is an alternate weapon intended for Jedi Shadows and their Imperial mirror, the Sith Assassin; however, it faces the exact same issues as the single-bladed Lightsaber. So yes, you are stuck with a DBLS.

Q: Do we have to wear robes? Can we wear pants?
A: Pants are rare, but exist. If you want to keep the pants look, find a moddable pair and you’ll be able to keep them all the way up into endgame.

Q: Can we really keep stuff the whole game and just keep modding it?
A: Yes and no. As soon as you find a chestpiece, pants, hat, weapon, gloves, and shoes – the most important stuff – with four upgrade slots, you can keep modding it for the whole level up game. It is rumored that Endgame, however, starts getting items with extra slots, and PvP gear has its expertise as a built-in, rather than a mod granted, stat. So you can keep it for most of the game. Endgame is where you will have more difficulties.

Q: Do the lightsaber animations ever look better?
A: Yes, at higher levels, particularly as Infiltration.

Q: What’s the best Skill Specialization for leveling?
A: Infiltration is, without question, the best Skill Specialization until about level 22 or so. Particle Acceleration and Kinetic Ward for Kinetic Combat, and Force in Balance for Balance Specialization, are lynchpin skills. Infiltration is good right off the bat. Balance is the weak link until you’re in your 30s, in my opinion, though it’s still quite tolerable to level with.

Q: What’s the difference between Jedi Sage and Jedi Shadow in the Balance tree?
A: They are both proc-heavy, DoT self-healing builds. It’s a question of whether you want to use your lightsaber and Project, or Telekinetic Throw and Disturbance. The Shadow gets better procs to compensate for its lower range and smaller Force Pool.

Q: Is the Jedi Shadow a main tank or an off-tank?
A: The Jedi Shadow is a main tank; it can off-tank, but there are no skill specializations devoted towards becoming an off-tank among any class. Fully developed, it has roughly the same standard survivability as a Jedi Guardian or Vanguard who was specialized to tank. The only guild in the general beta to test endgame operations used a Jedi Shadow main tank, however, and are quite happy with the Jedi Shadow’s performance there.

Q: What’s the difference between the three types of tanks?
A: Jedi Guardian tanks have the most survivability cooldowns, and once they get rolling, they have the most forgiving resource mechanic. They have the most issue generating threat, especially in ranged or AoE situations. Jedi Shadows have the fewest and weakest survivability cooldowns, but have the ability to self-heal regularly, a very high block chance, strong AoE threat and okay ranged threat. Shield Specialist Vanguards have a moderate amount of survivability cooldowns, okay AoE threat, great ranged threat/battlefield mobility, and the best straight mitigation. Their resource mechanic is very punishing if mishandled. The two force-users have more apparent flaws at lower levels, but grow into the role fully later.

Q: Should I play a Jedi Sentinel or a Jedi Shadow?
A: I assume that if you’re asking this question, tanking is not seriously on the table as a primary interest for you, in PvE or PvP. The Sentinel offers the three different types of specializations: the ability to play a survivable, elite-killer melee damage, an erratic high-burst melee damage specialization, and the ability to increase its battlefield control and mobility as a melee damage dealer. In comparison, the Shadow’s damage trees offer a steady pressure melee/range hybrid with minor erratic burst, or a controllable burst melee class with target lockdown options, along with both Shadow specializations having minor tanking options.

Q: Should I play a Scoundrel or a Jedi Shadow?
A: That depends. The Scoundrel is a more stealth-dependent class – while they both have multiple Stealth abilities, the Scoundrel is flatout dependent on Stealth for specific tactical openers, while the Shadow is more willing to engage in straight-up combat. The Scoundrel has more control, the Shadow has more survivability under fire. Someone seeking more traditional Rogue control-and-combo-based play may prefer the Scoundrel. Also, the Scoundrel has the ability to respecialize as a healer or throw out tactical support as a striker, while the Shadow has the ability to respecialize as a defender or throw out tactical control as a striker.

Q: Can the Jedi Shadow PvP builds tank in PvE?
A: I have not tried it myself. I’ve heard that it’s doable in flashpoints and easier heroic content, but not advised for harder ones.

Q: I’m going to do PvE. Does the Balance or Infiltration tree do higher max DPS?
A: Until we have damage meters or extensive theorycrafting of some kind, we cannot actually say with too much certainty which is the higher damage spec. Generally, they’re accepted to be competitive with one another in PvE. In PvP, they perform different roles – Balance is a steady pressure build, and Infiltration is a burst kill build.

Q: What’s the difference between an Assassin and a Shadow?
A: There are the obvious ones – different stories, companions, and titles. Visually, an Assassin’s Force Powers are centered around violet lightning, while a Shadow is reliant on golden energy and rocks or other environmental elements. Late game, the Shadow obtains Unity, which works great for Balance and Kinetic, while the Assassin gets Sacrifice, which is more suited to Kinetic and Infiltration.

Q: I want to play a Movie Jedi; is this the class for me?
A: You will not, despite promises of being ‘iconic’, be able to get everything about the Cinematic Jedi – Yoda, Luke Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Qui-Gon Jin, Anakin Skywalker, Mace Windu, etc – in any one class. The closest are the Jedi Guardian (wears heavy armor, however), Jedi Shadow (wields a double-bladed lightsaber), and a Jedi Sage (barely uses its lightsaber.) You’ll have to decide what you’re most willing to compromise on out of the three of them.

Q: What’s the story like?
A: The story is unaffected whether you are a Jedi Shadow or a Jedi Sage. The Jedi Consular’s storyline is based around suspense and philosophy, and is not to everyone’s tastes. You’ll find more energetic and boisterous stories among the other classes, but this storyline is – in BioWare’s words – supposed to be more along the themes of KotOR 2 than KotOR 1.

Q: Why don’t tanks take the Shadowy Veil skill?
A: That passive skill does not apply when a Shadow is in Combat Technique, which is our defender stance; it’s meant to improve the durability of a Shadow in Force Technique or Shadow Technique, our striker stances.

Q: Who is the best target to Guard, as a tank?
A: Pretty much anyone who’s going to get focused. This is usually the healer or a ball carrier in PvP; in PvE, the healer is probably the wiser option at low level, but as you get more AoE threat tools, you should instead be guarding the most effective DPS, in order to give them a higher threat ceiling while damaging. An AoE focused DPS is often a good choice.

Q: Do we get any evil companions?
A: Not really. Consulars get many companions who are not perfectly light-sided, but grayish white is the best overall depiction.

Q: Which abilities are off of the Global Cooldown?
A: Force Potency, Battle Readiness, Kinetic Ward, Mind Snap, Force Speed, Blackout, possibly others. Need to test more later.

Q: Does Telekinetic Throw qualify as a periodic damage ability?
A: That information is currently uncertain.

More questions to be added as needed later.

APPENDIX: MMO GLOSSARY

Activation Time: The amount of time used before an ability finishes its animations and triggers. Generally, being attacked during an activation causes pushback, and movement will cancel the activation.

AoE: Area-of-Effect ability. Refers to an ability that strikes an area, hitting all targets within that space. AoE abilities which only affect targets in melee range of the user are called Point-Blank Area-of-Effect, or PBAoE.

CC: Crowd Control. In the MMORPG context, it is used to refer to abilities which can reduce the number of opponents being faced at a given moment, without actually defeating one of them. Several abilities have crowd control effects which only trigger on Weak and Standard enemies, and will not work on Strong, Elite or Boss NPCs, or enemy players.

Channeled Ability: An ability of this kind begins triggering immediately, but does not finish until the activation bar is entirely depleted. If this ability is ended early for any reason, then you will not get the full effect of the ability, even though you have paid the full cost. Pushback on a channeled ability will cause the ability to end early. Moving, whether voluntarily or involuntarily, will always end a channeled ability prematurely. Alacrity does not affect channeled abilities.

Defender: See TANK.

DOT: Damage-over-time. See PERIODIC DAMAGE.

DPS: Literally, damage-per-second. It is also commonly used to refer to those characters who have damage-dealing as their primary mechanical mission. See STRIKER.

Global Cooldown: Global Cooldown: A 1.5 second delay after activating any instant ability, preventing you from activating the majority of other abilities. Successfully triggered non-instant abilities do not induce a global cooldown (or if they do, they generate one that is too low to reach via current alacrity values.) A rare few abilities are not affected by the Global Cooldown.

Interrupt: Broadly, any reason that an ability with an activation or channeling time is suddenly cancelled. More specifically, an ability that always causes cancellation of the target’s non-instant ability, and adds a cooldown before the target can attempt that ability again. They are sometimes sorted into the mutually exclusive categories of Soft Interrupt (which does not add a cooldown to the targeted ability) and Hard Interrupt. Mind Snap is a Jedi Shadow’s interrupt, and Jolt is a Sith Assassin’s.

Kiting: Using abilities and careful positioning to force a melee-primary opponent to follow another person at a distance like a kite – a successful example of kiting minimizes the amount of close-range time the melee-primary character is able to get.

Knockback: Not the same as pushback, knockback refers to a character being forcibly moved by another character (usually backwards).

OOF: Out of Force (points.) When you’ve exhausted your resource bar.

Periodic Damage: An effect which causes damage over time on a regular basis, such as every second or every three seconds, without further input from the user.

Proc: A “Programmed Random Occurence.” Essentially, a proc is any ability which activates randomly. If you have an ability which has a 10% chance to heal you in addition to its primary effect, that heal effect would be considered a proc.

Pushback: Not the same as knockback, pushback refers to an unexpected delay during the activation of a non-instant ability, or causing a pulse on a channeled ability to fail. Pushback is caused by taking damage from any hostile source during the activation of the ability. Several skills mitigate or remove pushback on specific abilities.

Resolve: A bar which fills up whenever a character is limited in their actions against their will by another player character, in any way, proportional to the severity of the limitation. It slowly depletes when not recently increased. When the bar is completely filled, the character becomes immune to all limiting effects for the next eight seconds, before the bar drains entirely.

Root: An ability which forces a character to remain stationary.

Snare: An ability which slows down a character’s movement speed, but they are still capable of moving.

Striker: A character whose primary role in a group setting is to deal damage to the opponents. See DPS.

Tank: A character whose primary role in a group setting is to attract the enemy’s attention and keep harmful damage away from other squad members.

Utility: Reference to abilities which do not directly relate to healing, damage dealing, or tanking but are combat-useful nonetheless.

KEYBINDS

Warning: I have a Razer Naga mouse, which has a NumPad on the side of the mouse, so my bind layouts will not be that useful to someone without the same mouse. If someone would like to offer their own bindmaps with common mice (incl. the standard two-button), I might post them.

ASTRALFIRE’S BINDS

SHADOW ASSASSIN DICTIONARY

If an ability name isn’t included, it is identically named across the two classes. Some of the more common skills are included as well.

Shadow to Assassin

Assassin to Shadow