UPDATED FOR ON ALERT & NEW FORMS: LAST UPDATED 18/06/12Like Cradock said the Specialist isn't for everybody and particularly after the New Forms changes it really doesn't have the outright energy management or off the bat damage of other ATs like the Soldier. Even the ranged powers only have 50ft range so it really is all about close combat.
The addition of Breakout Shot (since the specialist already had a form) adds further to the synergies in powers but means there's even more buff watching and careful power rotation than before.
This remains playable in both PvE and PvP. Pure PvE players could experiment with possibly removing Nailed to the Ground and Crippling Challenge but I choose to keep them in as they have their uses in PvE as well.
Powers:
1 Gunslinger
1 Blade Tempest (Crashing Crescendo)
6 Two-Gun Mojo (Nailed to the Ground, Crippling Challenge)
8 Lightning Reflexes (R2, R3)
11 Bullet Beatdown (R2, Not Without Incident) / Storm's Harvest
14 Form of the Tempest (R2)
17 Eye of the Storm (R2, Blade Beyond the Veil)
21 Parry
25 Breakaway Shot
30 Holdout Shot (R2, Stim Pack)
35 Lock N Load (R2, R3) / Masterful Dodge
40 Lead Tempest (R2, Tread Softly)
Travel:
TP1: Teleport (R2)
TP2: Athletics/Acrobatics (R2, R3)
Talents:
7 Shooter (Dex: 5, Ego: 5)
12 Martial Focus (Str: 5, Dex: 5)
15 Professional Athlete (Str: 5, Ego: 5)
20 Impresario (Dex: 5, Rec: 5)
25 Wordly (Ego: 5, Rec: 5)
30 Relentless (Str: 5, Rec: 5)
Dexterity Spec Tree:
Mastery [1/1] - Gain 20 Dexterity and 10 Crit Severity Rating and Avoidance Rating
•Gear Utilization [3/3] - Increases amount of Offense and Defense gained from Items
•Combat Training [2/3] - Offense boosts Crit Strike Rating
•*Evasion* [2/2] - Secondary Super Stats now give Avoidance
•*Deadly Aim* [3/3] - Secondary Super Stats now give Crit Severity
Guardian Spec Tree:
•Fortified Gear [3/3] - Increased Defense from Items
•Ruthless [2/2] - Increased Crit Severity
•*Retribution* [2/2] - ST attacks against you have a chance to proc Retribution causing increased Damage and Heals you every 2 seconds for 6 seconds
•*The Best Defense* [3/3] - Gain a portion of Offense from your Defense
Vindicator Spec Tree:
•Aggressive Stance [2/2] - Increases Defense by a portion of your Offense
•Merciless [2/3] - Increased Crit Severity
•The Rush Of Battle [2/3] - Gain a % of max Health over 5 seconds upon defeating an enemy
•*Modified Gear* [2/2] - Increased Offense from Items
•*Offensive Expertise* [2/2] - Lowers Recharge time for Active Offensives
Power Explanations:
Gunslinger: Energy Builder, no point upgrading but you will need to use this, especially on bosses.
Blade Tempest: You can use this on the move and the Crashing Crescendo is a stacking crit buff we can use. Good for chasing enemies down.
Two-Gun Mojo: With the advantages we are getting a awful lot of mileage out of this power. It's own damage isn't great but a full maintain of it grants a stack of the Concentration buff. This buff synergises with the the advantages on Lead Tempest and Bullet Breadown, boosts ranged damage a decent amount, boosts melee damage a small amount and also returns energy which will scale of our EGO stat. Keep that buff going as much as you can.
Nailed to the Ground cancels out travel powers making it fantastic for PvP and useful in PvE against flying enemies as your max range is 50ft and this can bring down mobs you want to get in melee range. Just tap to bring down flyers.
Crippling Challenge is a great opening skill and a phenomenal PvP skill. It breaks blocks and disables them & debuffs the target.
However it increases Threat and will taunt an AI mob into attacking you. You can off-Tank in this build so the attention should be fine (wanted even) as long as you are ready for it.
Fire this for a full maintain while getting into close combat range
Lightning Reflexes: Your defensive passive, uses your superstats to boost dodge and avoidance, Max this out, without this you will suffer.
Bullet Beatdown: Spam this against tougher mobs/bosses. Combo (flipping between piercing & crushing) so crits a bit more than Storm Harvest would have done and the Not Without Incident advantage with the concentration buff turn this power into a real beauty, adding AoE into the mix.
Form of the Tempest: A Toggled form which gives us the Focus buff and allows us to stack it 8 times, we gain stacks by critting. The Focus buff is similar to the Concentration one but only boosts Melee damage and also returns energy and scales with DEX. Ranking this power allows us to keep more stacks up outside of combat, we can gain them fast but since the specialist doesn't have an energy unlock this is our primary source of energy as well, that's ultimately why I recommend Rank 2.
Eye of the Storm: AoE dual blade skill with great damage absorbtion. Blade Beyond the Veil helps add boost the not great DPS but this is great for dropping into a cluster of Henchmen and wasting them all without taking a stratch.
Parry: Your Block enhancer, they hit you you hit them back. I chose not to rank this as you have other defenses so should need to turtle far less.
Breakaway Shot: This reverse lunge (leaping out of combat) looks fantastic, attacks on landing and grants us yet another buff (Defiant). Defiant increases our defense and grants a little energy. Fire it off in boss encounters and in vast groups of mobs.
Holdout Shot: Used carefully this is a really great power. The Stim Pack advantage applies a Heal over Time to you, handy on an AT. Hoever that's not this powers only trick. When you crit it does 100% more damage. When you fire it and your energy is under 20% it'll deal double damage and the HoT wil double as well. Rank 2 that sucker.
Lock N Load: Specialist has already plenty of defenses but Lock N Load will boost damage, increase crit change and reduced power cost and help with breakfree damage too making it preferable to Masterful Dodge. There is a case for taking the Two Smoking Barrels advantage and spamming melee powers to reduce the cooldown on Lock N Load but since that means melee looses the damage boost I'm not particularly a fan of it.
Lead Tempest: Another amazing looking power, a ranged AoE with decent damage. Tread softly also boosts Dodge & Avoid when fireing this power and if you have either the concentration buff on as well the dodge/avoid boost is doubled.
Travel Powers:
Normally I wouldn't dictate travel power choices but in this case I suspect you'll thank me.
Travel power 1: Teleport - Not great for travel across the world but amazing for dropping into a group of mobs and wasting them, also good for escaping if required.
Travel power 2: Athletics/Acrobatics, whichever, depends if you like the ninja run or not but this just looks so good paired with Breakaway Shot, fully ranked for world travel.
Talent Explanations:
Dex to boost you crit chance
Ego boosts ranged damage
Str boosts melee damage
I've opted to add a little Rec in there to help keep your Energy Equilbrium up but a bit of Con would work too.
Gearing:
Aim to get lots of Dex (300+ at lvl40) to help crit lots and return energy, Str & Ego I've taken to about 230 (at lvl40) each.
Heroic Breastplate of Elusiveness [29 Defense,139 Dodge Chance] & Gambler's Lucky Gem
Heroic Gloves of Precision [19 Defense,68 Offense,95 Critical Strike] & Gambler's Lucky Gem
Heroic Helmet of Utility [19 Defense,139 Cost Discount,139 Cooldown Reduction] & Impact Prism
I'd use Secondaries to drop in some Con, Rec or Int. Con helps add HP, Rec keeps your Equilbrum up which helps energy management and Int helps reduce powers cost and reduce cooldowns on Lock N Load and Holdout Shot.
I recommend packing these devices
Nimbus of Force (Bloodmoon device that bubble shields multiple friendlies)
A stack of MARS heals / Heroic Resonance or similar
Amazing Grace (Bloodmoon Device that acts like Masterful Dodge)
A self rez like Triumphant Recovery or Zombie Powder for Lockout battles
Archers Memory (Bloodmoon 100ft High DPS Maintain ranged attack) and/or 100ft ranged attack devices (harmon tazers for example) as all your attacks are 50ft or less.
Playstyle:
Did I mention all the buffs and the need to keep an eye on them? Yeah you really need one eye on them, your health and energy and one eye on the mobs, if you can't do that then the specialist probably isn't for you.
Firing Eye of the Storm or Lead Tempest into a cluster of mobs should crit lots and gain your focus buffs quickly, Two gun any mobs with more than one health bar first if you can.
You can off tank bosses by pasting two-gun but you don't have enough threat management tools in hybrid role to fully tank.
spam Bullet Beatdown on bosses, chase them with blade tempest / two gun if they move away.
Lock N Load when ever you can.
Aim to fire holdout shot when you are below 20% energy for a 1k heal.
We have two more small heals over time in the spec trees (Retribution & The Rush of Battle) but they are mostly to maintain heal so you can concentrate on leaping into the next cluster of mobs (keeping your focus buffs up) rather than pausing to heal up.
