Seer Sage
This is a preliminary guide that provides details on abilities and skill changes and initial recommendations for skill tree choices and an overview on the changes to the rotation. I suggest reading this guide in combination with the 6.0 class guide to understand the previous rotation to then adapt to 7.0 as discussed briefly herein. More detailed guides will be forthcoming after preliminary guides are posted for all disciplines.
Combat Style Abilities & Passive Skills
Discipline Passive Skills
Immutable Force
(Not on ability tree) Reduces the activation time of Deliverance by 0.5 seconds and the Force consumed by Benevolence by 5.
Foresight
Reduces the pushback suffered while activating healing abilities by 75% and lowers the threat generated by healing abilities by 10%.
Conveyance
Your Rejuvenate grants Conveyance for up to 15 seconds, which increases the effect of your next healing ability:
Benevolence: Critical chance increased by 60%
Deliverance: Activation time reduced by 0.5 seconds
Healing Trance: Critical chance increased by 25%
Salvation: Activates instantly
Wandering Mend: Immediately roams to and heals each target, without waiting for the target to take damage first.
Mend Wounds
Restoration now removes negative physical effects and heals the target. Increases Force critical chance and damage reduction by 3%.
Force Shelter
Increases the duration of Rejuvenate by 6 seconds. In addition, Rejuvenate grants protection to its target for 45 seconds. Protected targets have their armor rating increased by 10%. 1 second after refreshing your Rejuvenate on a target, the target will receive a heal plus any healing that remained from the previous Rejuvenate.
Clairvoyance
Increases the critical chance of Benevolence by 10%. Increases the healing done by Rejuvenate by 10%.
Resplendence
Healing Trance critical heals grant a charge of Resplendence, stacking up to 3 times. Using Vindicate with Resplendence consumes a charge, restores 5 additional Force, and does not make you Weary.
Altruism
Mind Crush, Disturbance, Deliverance, and Salvation grant Altruism, which causes your next Benevolence to activate instantly, consume no Force, and heal for 50% more. This effect may not occur more than once every 10 seconds.
Amnesty
Force Barrier now purges the Weary effect caused by Vindicate. In addition, spending a charge of Resplendence on Vindicate grants Amnesty, increasing your Force regeneration rate by 2 for up to 10 seconds if you are not Weary or removing a single stack of Weary otherwise. The Amnesty effect will be lost early if Vindicate is activated without a charge of Resplendence.
Soothing Protection
Force Armor grants 10 charges of Soothing Protection to the target. Targets with your Soothing Protection will lose a charge of it each time you directly heal them. If Force Armor concludes early, the target is healed per remaining charge of Soothing Protection.
Discipline Skill Tree
Recommendations
Level 23
Keeper of Peace
Keeper of Peace is a great choice for situations where a second player will get effective healing from the extra Deliverance. It doubles the healing power of the ability versus Sustained Aura that does a bit over half the extra healing over time.
Sustained Aura
Sustained Aura provides less healing than Keeper of Peace but is better for single target sustained healing. Take in fights
Level 27
Cloud Mind
I generally recommend Cloud Mind for the extra DR for predictable damage because Bastion of Light is unlikely to add much healing over a fight.
Bastion of Light
Bastion of Light is not a great passive since a good Seer healer should not be using Benevolence often and only when procced by Altruism every 10 seconds or so. That should lead to an average of 3 extra ticks of Rejuvenate per minute. That small HPS increase is still larger than other options in this tier but is so small that Cloud Mind may be the better option for spike DR.
Level 39
Rejuvenating Aura
Rejuvenating Aura is helpful for group healing by letting you spread Rejuvenate to other players. This passive is less useful than one might expect since it will not tick or refresh Rejuvenate on players who already have the HoT. Take it for fights with group healing where either the group has a lot of melee players or where staying grouped up is convenient.
Resurging Power
Resurging Power provides up to a 9% healing buff on several of your rotational single target heals. The buff lasts 9 seconds so should have very high uptime. I recommend this skill for encounters where single target healing is most important or where spreading Rejuvenate will not work efficiently.
Level 43
Force Empowerment
Seer has no other amazing options in this tier so is a good choice to bring the raid buff compared to Sage DPS in the group.
Force Defense
If another Sage is bringing a raid buff then take Force Defense for full uptime on a 6% DR buff.
Level 51
Force Mobility
Healing Trance is your most important healing ability so being able to use it on the move is critical.
Level 64
Valorous Spirit
Valorous Spirit is a solid skill for survivability to allow self healing more often and add DR to the ability. Take it in all situations unless you are also taking the Unmatched Haste legendary.
Metaphysical Alacrity
Metaphysical Alacrity is useful for healers primarily if taking the Unmatched Haste package, as using Force Speed on cooldown will lower the cooldown and extend the duration of Mental Alacrity.
Level 68
Phase Walk
Phase Walk is useful on nearly all encounters for movement while other options are rarely useful.
Level 73
Mind Ward
Mind Ward offers DR against periodic damage that is present in most encounters. Other options are highly situational.
Skill Tree
Level 15 - Gain 2 Abilities
Preserved Force Armor
30m range, costs 26 Force. Surrounds the target in a Force shield that lasts up to 30 seconds and absorbs damage. The target becomes Force-imbalanced and cannot benefit from Force Armor again for 15 seconds. Reduces the Force consumed by Force Armor by 15 and reduces the duration of Force-imbalance by 5 seconds. Additionally, increases the amount of damage absorbed by your Force Armor by 10%.
Deliverance
30m range, 2s cast, costs 45 Force. Heals a friendly target.
Level 23 - Pick 1 Upgrade for Deliverance
Keeper of Peace (ability)
30m range, 2s cast, costs 45 Force. Heals up to two friendly targets instead of one. Replaces Deliverance.
Sustained Aura (passive)
Deliverance applies Sustained Aura, which heals the target over 12 seconds.
Hastening Call (passive)
After casting Deliverance you are granted Haste, making your next Deliverance instant. This effect can occur once every 10 seconds.
Level 27 - Pick 1 Ability or Passive Skill
Cloud Mind (ability)
45s cooldown. Wipes your enemies' thoughts, instantly lowering your threat by a moderate amount. Activating Cloud Mind grants Blockout, which increases damage reduction by 25% for 6 seconds.
Benevolent Haste (passive)
Benevolence increases the movement speed of the target by 50% for 6 seconds. This effect cannot occur more than once every 12 seconds.
Bastion of Light (passive)
Benevolence has a 50% chance to cause your Rejuvenate to tick twice.
Level 35 - Gain Ability
Healing Trance
30m range, 9s cooldown, 2.7s channel, costs 60 Force. Heals a friendly target and consumes 60 Force over the channel duration. Healing Trance channels and ticks 10% faster.
Level 39 - Pick 1 Upgrade for Healing Trance
Potent Resolve (passive)
Mental Alacrity increases the healing done by Healing Trance by 3%.
Resurging Power (passive)
Healing Trance builds stacks of Resurging Power, each stack increases the healing done by Benevolence, Keeper of Peace, or Deliverance by 3% per stack. Can stack up to 3 times.
Rejuvenating Aura (passive)
Healing Trance spreads your Rejuvenate heal to nearby allies.
Level 43 - Pick 1 Ability or Passive Skill
Force Defense (passive)
Channeling Healing Trance grants a stack of Force Defense. Each stack grants 2% damage reduction per stack. Max of 3 times.
There is no Death (passive)
If a friendly player has Rejuvenate applied to them and is killed during the duration of Rejuvenate, your next Revival, Rally, or Deliverance is instant. In addition, when taking direct damage the cooldown on Force Barrier is reduced by 3 seconds and the cooldown on Rescue is reduced by 2 seconds. This effect can occur once every 5 seconds.
Force Empowerment (ability)
300s cooldown, costs 45 Force. Increases mastery, endurance, and presence for you and your operation group members within 40 meters by 10%. Lasts 10 seconds.
Level 47 - Gain Ability
Salvation
30m range, 12s cooldown, 2s cast, costs 54 Force. Applies a periodic healing effect to up to 8 allies within 8 meters of the targeted area, which heals over 10 seconds. Once a target has received the periodic healing effect, the target may leave the area and will continue to be healed by the effect.
Level 51 - Pick 1 Passive Skill
Telekinetic Defense
Your Force Armor reverberates with Force energy, blasting attackers for energy damage when it absorbs direct damage to you. This effect does not affect Force Armors placed on allies and cannot occur more than once each second.
Force Mobility
Turbulence, Healing Trance, and Force Serenity may be activated while moving.
Resistance
Increases damage reduction by 3%.
Level 60 - Gain Ability
Wandering Mend
30m range, 15s cooldown, costs 45 Force. Places a mending Force on a friendly target that heals them the next time they take damage. After healing the target, Wandering Mend travels to another friendly target within 20 meters. Wandering Mend lasts up to 30 seconds on each target and travels up to 3 times, healing up to 4 targets. Wandering Mend can only be placed on one target at a time. Wandering Mend grants resistance to the targets it heals for 45 seconds. Resistant targets have their internal and elemental damage reduction increased by 3%.
Level 64 - Pick 1 Passive Skill
Metaphysical Alacrity
Reduces the cooldowns of Force Speed by 5 seconds, Force Slow by 3 seconds, and Force Barrier by 30 seconds. In addition, Mental Alacrity lasts 0.5 seconds longer, Mental Alacrity increases your movement speed by 100% while active, and the active cooldown of Force Speed is finished when Force Barrier ends.
Valorous Spirit
Force Mend increases your damage reduction by 15% for 6 seconds. Additionally, reduces the cooldown of Force Mend by 5 seconds.
Kinetic Collapse
Force Armors you place on yourself erupt in a flash of light when they end, blinding up to 8 nearby enemies for 3 seconds. This effect breaks from direct damage.
Level 68 - Pick 1 Ability
Telekinetic Blitz
30m range, 10s cooldown, costs 45 Force. Deals kinetic damage to your target and leaves you feeling Empowered for up to 5 seconds. The Empowered effect can stack three times, with each stack increasing Telekinetic Blitz damage by 30%. The ability has 3 charges and recharges every 10 seconds. In addition, Telekinetic Blitz’s damage is increased by 10% and if applicable healing.
Force Lift
30m range, 60s cooldown, costs 9 Force. Lifts the target helplessly into the air, preventing all action for up to 60 seconds. Non-player, non-standard, and non-weak targets heal rapidly while trapped. Damage causes this effect to end prematurely.
Phase Walk
1.5s cooldown, 0.5s cast. Activating this ability marks your current location for 10 minutes. When this ability is activated again, if you are within 60 meters of the marked location, you instantly return to the marked location. Phase Walk goes on cooldown for 60 seconds when used to return to the marked location.
Level 73 - Pick 1 Passive Skill
Egress
Force Speed grants Egress, removing all movement-impairing effects and granting immunity to them for the duration.
Confound
Targets affected by your Weaken Mind are slowed by 30% for its duration.
Mind Ward
Reduces the damage taken from all periodic effects by 15%.
Gearing in 7.0
Summary
Please see my initial 7.0 Gearing Guide for more information on gearing.
Preliminary gearing targets for Balance Sage should be as follows:
Legendary: Revitalize and either Unmatched Haste or Dynamic Force
Tactical: One for All
Relics: Focused Retribution and either Serendipitous Assault or Devastating Vengeance
Crystal: Eviscerating or War Hero
Stim: Versatile stim (Proficient stim if gearing for off-DPS or running Metaphysical Mender)
Adrenal: Critical or Attack adrenal
Regarding Relics, Crystals and Adrenals, Critical Rating will be more valuable in lower tiers of gear or gear that has not yet been augmented. As the player moves through Rakata gear up to item rating 330 and beyond, it is expected that Mastery will be preferred. As such, I'd mostly suggest using whichever is most convenient as the impact on performance will be relatively low.
Tertiary stats and augments should be allocated as follows:
Accuracy Rating: 0 (heals do not miss)
Alacrity Rating: 2,250 - 2,400 (1.4s GCD assuming no Zeal perk), 3,210 - 3,400 (1.3s GCD with Zeal perk)
Critical Rating: All remaining tertiary stats
Some healers may benefit from gearing extra Alacrity Rating above the necessary level to achieve a consistent GCD. Seer benefits less from extra Alacrity Rating than tech-based healers but this is very much a personal preference.
If running Metaphysical Mender then some Accuracy Rating will be beneficial. 2,694 Accuracy Rating is necessary to reach 110% accuracy and ensure uses of Telekinetic Blitz do not miss.
Legendary Implants
Dynamic Force Package
The cooldown of Force Potency is reduced by 15 seconds. Package contains Critical Rating.
Comments: Force Potency is a good cooldown for Sage healers. It lets the healer nearly guarantee full stacks of Resplendence for energy management and further buffs the ability to burst heal, which remains the Sage healer's biggest strength.
The Dynamic Force package is good but not great primarily because the uptime of its buff is very low. Force Potency has a 90s cooldown that Dynamic Force reduces to 75s. Assuming the healer used Force Potency on cooldown then you would need a 7.5 minute fight for the cooldown reduction to allow even one extra use. With that said, it coming off cooldown earlier could still be useful in allowing for earlier uses of Force Potency to help heal through burst damage phases.
I recommend Dynamic Force as a potential alternative to Unmatched Haste primarily because both are weak and neither is particularly strong.
Revitalize Package
While Rejuvenate is active on a target, it has a 15% chance to spontaneously heal the target whenever the target receives non-Rejuvenate healing from you. Package contains Critical Rating.
Comments: Revitalize is not a powerful legendary and together with the other options represents a significant downgrade from the Empowered Restorer set bonus in 6.x. I recommend Revitalize (assuming the reported bugs are fixed in 7.0.1) primarily as the only legendary that will consistently and reliably add sustained healing. Sage's biggest weakness is sustained and group healing and Revitalize should buff both of those even if only slightly.
The 15% proc chance sounds really low and it is. A 15% chance is low enough that RNG may cause you to go long stretches without any extra healing. However, consider how many ticks of healing go out on targets over the course of a fight and that many players should have high uptime of Rejuvenate due to the Rejuvenating Aura passive. The combination of using Healing Trance to spread Rejuvenate and using Salvation for group healing should enable many extra ticks of Rejuvenate to help in self healing. Salvation ticks 8 times over its duration so on average each use of Salvation should provide an extra tick of Rejuvenate to each player that already has Rejuvenate on them. Rejuvenate should tick on average for nearly 3 times the tick of each Salvation tick, so getting an extra Rejuvenate tick of healing would increase the healing done by Salvation by around 30-40%. That is a pretty significant buff for group healing alone.
Rejuvenate is far less useful for single target healing because there are fewer instances of healing ticks going out to proc Revitalize. However, Revitalize will still add additional healing directly as compared to Dynamic Force which might let you use Force Potency one extra time in a fight or Unmatched Haste that will improve your APMs but not directly add healing potency.
There have reported bugs of Revitalize not functioning correctly. Assuming these are addressed such that the package works as stated via the tooltip, Revitalize should be a decent option to buff the Seer Sage's group healing toolkit and provide a nominal buff to single target sustained healing.
Unmatched Haste Package
The duration of Mental Alacrity is increased by 5 seconds, and using Force Speed reduces the active cooldown of Mental Alacrity by 5 seconds. Package contains Critical Rating.
Comments: Unmatched Haste is lackluster for healers but a viable option since it seems likely to provide a stronger HPS benefit than Dynamic Force.
Mental Alacrity does not provide any direct healing benefit unlike for damage disciplines that take the Gathering Storm package. Mental Alacrity is still beneficial for healing since it significantly increases your alacrity and lets you burst heal by using more abilities in a given time.
Using Force Speed on cooldown should be familiar to Sages who also play damage disciplines though it is a wrinkle for healers to do so. Taking Unmatched Haste also requires sacrificing some survivability since you will want to take Metaphysical Alacrity at level 64 instead of Valorous Spirit.
I think Unmatched Haste is a better option than Dynamic Force. As I mention above in the discussion of Dynamic Force, most fights on average will let you use Force Potency one more time through the fight due to its cooldown reduction. One or two extra uses of Mental Alacrity and its extended duration will let you use several extra healing abilities and thus provide significantly more healing.
With all that said, both Dynamic Force and Unmatched Haste are really weak as healing legendary packages. I hope the devs will consider buffing Unmatched Haste in some fashion to benefit heals such as adding a 10% buff to healing during Mental Alacrity or something along those lines.
Tacticals
One for All
Wandering Mend receives one additional charge.
Analysis:
One for All is a great tactical for all situations as it buffs an ability that is useful in single target and group damage situations.
All for One
Salvation's pool concludes with a burst of light Force energy, healing up to 8 allies within it.
Analysis:
This tactical is nominally better for AoE healing than One for All but its positional requirements and Salvation overall being a relatively weak AoE heal make it less useful. I would only recommend All for One in 16m operations where the healer can be highly confident that the burst heal will be effective for 8 people. In all other situations, I recommend One for All.
Metaphysical Mender
Damaging an enemy with Telekinetic Blitz causes your ally closest to the enemy to be healed, scaling with how many Empowered charges you have. Each charge of Empowered reduces the amount of Force that Telekinetic Blitz consumes by 30%.
Analysis:
Metaphysical Mender requires taking Telekinetic Blitz at level 68 to enable the similar damage/healing playstyle utilized with the Endless Offensive set bonus in 6.x. This tactical is neat in that it allows a hybrid damage/healer playstyle where Telekinetic Blitz deals damage and heals. However, it provides less sustained healing and requires some Accuracy Rating to ensure your damage-heals do not miss. Metaphysical Mender is worth picking up but is not recommended as a primary use tactical, but can be useful for encounters where sustained healing is not intensive or where damage checks are more relevant to group success.
Rotation
7.0 Seer Sage should feel very familiar to 6.x Seer Sage with only a few tweaks. The key changes are as follows:
Force Armor no longer applies an immediate heal and an over time heal due to the removal of the Empowered Restorer set bonus.
Each Sage gets a different version of Force Armor. Seer gets a cheaper Force Armor with a shorter lockout before it can be used again and absorbs more damage. On balance Force Armor is still far weaker due to the absence of the healing set bonus buff from 6.x.
Deliverance (or its alternative, Keeper of Peace) will either add a heal over time or heal a second person for the full amount depending on the level 23 skill choice.
You will either retain Cloud Mind for DR or can buff Benevolence to have a 50% chance to tick Rejuvenate at Level 27.
Healing Trance will either spread Rejuvenate to nearby targets (but will not tick or refresh it) or will maintain uptime on a 9% healing buff to Deliverance and Benevolence depending on the level 39 skill choice.
Seer Sage is the best choice to bring a raid buff if Sage DPS are in the group because the level 43 skill choice alternatives are either 6% DR or arguably the silliest skill choice in the game (There is no Death).
Sages in general lost a lot of mitigation. Telekinetic Defense (Force Armor's reflect damage), Resistance (3% DR) and Valorous Spirit (15% DR from Self Mend and CD reduction) are all locked into skill trees where you may need to pick something else.
As far as overall playstyle, Seer will play similarly. Your priorities will remain to
Keep Force Armor up on targets taking consistent damage
Use Rejuvenate, Healing Trance and Wandering Mend on cooldown in most situations. Rejuvenate is a burst heal when used on cooldown on a target taking high sustained damage. Healing Trance is the best ability to consume the Conveyance buff (+25% critical chance) unless it can be used on a Altruism Benevolence per #4.
Use Vindicate periodically to regenerate Force
Use Deliverance at least once every 10 seconds to proc Altruism to provide a free and buffed Benevolence. Combining the Conveyance buff from Rejuvenate with an Altruism-buffed Benevolence is your most powerful and energy efficient single target heal.
Use Deliverance for filler single target healing and Salvation for group healing
Try to avoid using Conveyance on either Deliverance or Salvation and try to avoid using Benevolence at all unless if is glowing from Altruism (and thus buffed and free)
The playstyle differences from class changes primarily relate to the effects of skill tree choices.
Deliverance can flex between a stronger single target or group heal depending on skill tree choices. Deliverance can do around 50% more single target healing through the Sustained Aura passive or do 100% more group healing by healing a second target for the full amount via Keeper of Peace. Deliverance/Keeper of Peace should also be buffed by 9% if taking Resurging Power. Deliverance was already the Seer Sage's filler heal so these changes make it a more powerful filler with the focus on single target or group healing changing from fight to fight and depending on your co-healer.
Healing Trance has a lot of potential use to buff group healing by spreading Rejuvenate to friendly players via the level 39 Rejuvenating Aura passive skill. This skill needs some tweaks in my opinion as it is very clunky to use since it does not refresh Rejuvenate. However, having Rejuvenate up on most of the group is a nice group healing benefit and lets you more easily flex to use Rejuvenate with Renewal to burst heal non-tanks. This skill tree also synergizes with the Revitalize package to significantly buff the group healing from Salvation by letting those ticks trigger extra heals from Rejuvenate.
The damage/healing playstyle introduced by the Endless Offensive set bonus and Metaphysical Mender tactical in 6.x is still viable and easier to add as a potential playstyle choice. The Endless Offensive set bonus is now baked into the Telekinetic Blitz skill at level 68 and only requires sacrificing Phase Walk, while the Metaphysical Mender tactical requires swapping out One for All. As a general matter, I do not expect this playstyle to be optimal for healing output due uses of Telekinetic Blitz requiring fewer uses of Deliverance and thus wasting several of the skill tree buffs. However, some fights that focus more on damage checks may benefit from this playstyle to add damage. I would suggest players try this out based on a 6.x guide so they can swap to is as necessary if damage checks are an issue.