Fury Marauder
Last Updated: 5/29/21
Table of Contents
Overview
About the Class
Fury is a burst DPS class. Historically it has generally been relegated to a PVP-only discipline, with Annihilation taking top overall sustained DPS and Carnage top burst DPS in PVE content. Now, Fury is one of the strongest DPS classes in the game, benefiting from exceptional burst and sustained DPS while maintaining all the Marauder defensive and utility abilities. The discipline revolves around using Raging Burst, Furious Strike, and Obliterate as often as possible. It also requires careful management of Fury to enable rotational use of Berserk. Overall, Fury is definitely the most difficult Marauder discipline to play well, as mistakes in the rotation can quickly lead to it breaking down, as compared to Annihilation which does nearly as good sustained DPS and is much more forgiving.
Utility and Mobility
Marauders bring a lot to the table in these areas. The Marauder offers Bloodthirst as arguably the best group buff increasing damage and healing by 10% for 10 seconds. For mobility, the Marauder can use Predation to increase team movement speed by 40% (can be buffed higher with a Utility) for 10 seconds. Marauders can use Force Camouflage as a semi-stealth ability. Marauders can also use Force Charge and Mad Dash to quickly move around. Marauders can also use a utility to make Force Camouflage a self-cleanse.
Survivability
Marauders gain benefits to direct and AoE damage reduction through skills and Utilities, wear medium armor, and have several strong defensive cool-downs (Saber Ward, Force Camouflage, Undying). Skilled players can also use Mad Dash to cheese various mechanics. On any fights where Juggernaut can not use saber reflect repeatedly, Marauders comfortably take second place amongst all melee DPS for the strength of their defensive abilities (second to Assassins with many regular defensives).
6.0 Impact on Discipline
Fury was one of the strongest DPS disciplines in 5.X due to great burst damage and very strong sustained damage that is competitive with Annihilation. The discipline also performed very well in PVP due to its burst and use of Obliterate as a second leap that ignores certain movement debuffs.
In 6.0 the discipline received a healthy buff via a great set bonus in Descent of the Fearless and a nice buff to its sustained damage via the Cauterized Coronary tactical item. Combined, the two provide Fury with nearly full uptime of a 10% damage buff, consistent 25% damage buffs to its heaviest hitting ability in Raging Burst, and an additional DoT that should have full uptime on most fights.
Early in 6.0, the verdict is that Fury will retain its reputation for having exceptional burst damage and strong sustained damage. It lost a little ground to Annihilation in sustained damage due to the Spiteful Saber tactical being more powerful for that discipline than Cauterized Coronary, but should still be a very strong option for all fights.
Role in Operations
Fury is a very flexible discipline since it does great burst and sustained DPS. As such, I would recommend using Fury to fill any role that does not have an ideal fit in the operation team’s group composition (e.g., if all other disciplines are DoT-based, Fury can handle more target swapping assignments).
Utilities
I usually take some combination of the following Utilities, though the optimal combination can change from fight to fight. As of 6.0, the tiers have been reorganized.
Skillfull Tier
You must take 3 to advanced to Masterful.
Brazen – Increases your damage reduction by 2%, and you build 2 Fury when attacked. This Fury building effect cannot occur more than once every 1.5 seconds.
Brazen should always be taken as it provides a permanent damage reduction and increased Fury generation, which leads to more frequent Berserk use. Always take.
Cloak of Carnage – Increases the damage dealt by Cloak of Pain by 15% and increases its duration by 4 seconds.
This utility provides a sizable buff to Cloak of Pain damage and should be taken in any fights where it is useful.
Cloak of Rage – While Cloak of Pain is active, it generates 1 Rage whenever you are attacked. This effect cannot occur more than once every 2 seconds.
A useful utility on fights where Cloak of Pain will trigger frequently to further buff Rage generation.
Inexorable - You generate 4 Rage when stunned, immobilized, put to sleep, or knocked around. Also, the cooldown of Unleash is reduced by 30 seconds.
Situational utility for fights with lots of physics effects (e.g., Underlurker) can lead to effectively unlimited Rage. Only take in those situations.
Path Carver - Sweeping Slash deals 25% more damage.
Usually not taken due to better benefits from other Skillful utilities. However, any situations with sustained AoE (e.g., Hive Queen Veteran Mode) could greatly benefit from this utility due to Sweeping Slash replacing Vicious Slash in the rotation.
Defensive Roll – Reduces damage taken from area effects by 30% and increases internal and elemental damage reduction by 3%.
Another great mitigation utility that should always be taken. AoE damage is present in nearly every fight and I/E damage is unable to be mitigated except through utilities like these.
Masterful Tier
You must take 6 between Heroic and Masterful.
Relentless – Predation no longer requires or consumes Fury, but will go on cooldown for 30 seconds when activated.
This should always be taken for any fights where movement is relevant or where the 10% defense buff is helpful. Having to use Fury stacks to trigger Predation is a notable DPS loss by being unable to use Berserk instead. I pretty much always take this utility, though in some circumstances I might trade for another utility.
Expunging Camouflage - Force Camouflage removes all cleanseable effects when activated.
This utility provides Marauders a relatively short cooldown (45s) self-cleanse and should be taken for any fights with heavy hitting DoTs (e.g., Dread Council fight to self-cleanse Death Mark).
Cloak of Annihilation - Each use of Assault, Battering Assault, and Crippling Slash reduces the active cooldown of Cloak of Pain by 3 seconds.
Another utility that buffs Rebuke, this utility significantly reduces the cooldown of Cloak of Pain. In fights where Marauders take damage that procs Cloak of Pain, this utility can significantly increase DPS.
Undying - Increases the duration of Undying Rage by 2 seconds and reduces its cooldown by 30 seconds.
The default duration for Undying Rage is 4 seconds, so this utility provides a 50% increase in duration. For any fights where those extra 2 seconds are meaningful for non-instant short duration high damage mechanics, it should be taken. However, most high damage mechanics are nearly instant, in which case the default 4 seconds is plenty. An example of a useful situation is in Master & Blaster encounter in Ravagers operation, if helping take stacks of Ion Cutter from Master the extra duration could be useful. Given the long cooldown I rarely take this utility.
Heroic Tier
A maximum of 3 utilities
Unbound - When Predation is applied or refreshed, it purges movement-impairing effects. Also, the movement speed bonus of Predation is increased by 30%.
This utility synergizes with Relentless to make Predation a very powerful movement utility. It isn’t beneficial on every fight and can be swapped for other utilities when not useful.
Brooding - Reduces the cooldown of Intimidating Roar by 15 seconds. Also, you build up to 30 Fury over the course of using Channel Hatred. This effect cannot occur more than once every 30 seconds.
Brooding is frequently taken for QoL purposes despite having no benefit after a fight starts. The optimal setup is to take it, use energy regen to get 30 stacks of Fury, then respec utilities to take another choice.
Interloper - Force Charge grants Interloper, allowing you to activate Force Charge a second time. Interloper lasts up to 7.5 seconds and is removed if Force Charge is reused. If Interloper is not utilized by the end of its duration, Force Charge is placed on a 7.5 second cooldown. Also, Force Charge now builds 2 Fury.
This utility is very situational utility for fights with lots of movement between adds (e.g., Draxus fight in Dread Fortress). Otherwise should not be taken.
Through Victory - Mad Dash can be used while immobilized, purges movement-impairing effects when activated, and deal 50% more damage. Also, the cooldown of Mad Dash is reduced by 10 seconds.
This utility is highly situational where roots are common and Mad Dash can be used. Mad Dash also has great potential to cheese high damage mechanics, so a lower cooldown could be helpful. Again, highly situational.
Ruthless Aggressor - Vicious Throw refunds 2 Rage when used on any targeted affected by your Obfuscate, regardless of remaining health. Also, activating Obfuscate grants Ruthless Aggressor, reducing the damage you take from Force and Tech attacks by 75% for 6 seconds.
I do not usually take this utility but it has some potential as a defensive cooldown in any instances where it can trigger.
Example Utility Build
Here is what I run for most encounters, though I frequently take other situational utilities for specific fights.
Key Passives
Decimate - Increases the damage dealt by Smash by 40% and reduces the cooldown of Smash and Raging Burst by 3 seconds each.
This passive ability is notable because it buffs Smash’s damage to provide a very powerful AoE ability. Given that all other passives below affecting Raging Burst similarly impact Smash, this makes the two interchangeable depending on single target (use Raging Burst) or AoE (use Smash).
Battle Cry - Reduces the cooldown of Obliterate by 3 seconds and causes Force Charge and Obliterate to make your next Force Scream deal 5% more damage and generate 1 Rage, rather than consume Rage.
Rage management is a key element of the Fury rotation (along with managing Fury, they are the dual resources for Fury to perform well). Force Scream’s cooldown of 12s pre-alacrity means that it can be used every other 6 GCD rotation block. Due to Obliterate being used every 9s / 6 GCDs, Force Scream should always have this buff. As such, it is critical to use it regularly in the rotation as it does very high damage and is net positive to Rage.
Rout - Assault, Battering Assault, Vicious Slash, Sweeping Slash, Force Scream, Vicious Throw, and Furious Strike reduce the active cooldown of Smash, Raging Burst, and Obliterate by 1 second.
This passive is very important when building a rotation. Raging Burst and Obliterate need to be utilized on the same cooldown as Furious Strike. However, the default cooldowns for both are longer than Furious Strike. As such, the rotation MUST ensure the specified abilities are utilized sufficiently within each 6 GCD rotation to get their cooldown to 6 GCDs.
Dominate - Force Charge and Obliterate make your next Smash or Raging Burst used within 20 seconds an automatic critical hit.
This passive reinforces the need to use Obliterate on the same cooldown as Raging Burst, as it ensures Raging Burst (or Smash in AoE situations) will always be a guaranteed critical hit.
Cascading Power - Increases all damage dealt by 5% for 6 seconds after dealing damage with Smash or Raging Burst. This effect cannot occur more than once every 8 seconds.
This passive reinforces the need to use Raging Burst as often as possible due to the 5% damage buff. Use of adrenals should always make sure to capture this burst window and endeavor to use as many higher damage abilities within it as possible.
Destruction - Berserk and Force Crush grant Destruction, increasing the damage dealt by your next Smash or Raging Burst by 15% and making your next Smash or Raging Burst consume no Rage.
This passive is probably the biggest key to the rotation and its complexity/difficulty. See below for further discussion as to how Destruction impacts the rotation, but the very short summary is that it makes effective Fury generation extremely important as well as alternating use of Berserk and Force Crush such that Raging Burst is always buffed and never costs Rage. Failing to do so dramatically weakens the rotation due to the decrease in rotational Rage for filler abilities.
Force Flagellation - Vicious Slash and Sweeping Slash deal additional Force energy damage. Also, damage dealt by Smash and Raging Burst overwhelms targets for 45 seconds. Overwhelmed targets take 10% more damage from AoE attacks.
This passive buffs Vicious Slash and Sweeping Slash, which in Fury should be used once every 6 GCDs due to (1) lowering the cooldown on Obliterate and Raging Burst per the Rout passive; and (2) generating 4 Fury per use to ensure Berserk can be used on time. The Overwhelmed debuff is not super useful in single target encounters (though some other disciplines will benefit from it, like Madness Sorcerer and Hatred Assassin) but shines in AoE situations where Smash and Sweeping Slash replace Raging Burst and Vicious Slash, respectively.
Furious Rage - Furious Strike grants Furious Rage, increasing the critical damage bonus for your next Smash or Raging Burst by 15%.
This passive further emphasizes the need to use Furious Strike, Raging Burst and Obliterate on cooldown to their synergies and buffs to each other. Since Raging Burst should always be a guaranteed critical hit (due to Obliterate via the Dominate passive) and should always get +15% damage and not cost Rage (via the Destruction passive), when used on cooldown and benefiting from this passive, Raging Burst becomes immensely powerful via a 100% critical chance, +30% damage, and not costing Rage!
Bloody Slashes - Damage dealt by Ravage stacks a burning effect on the target that builds up to 3 charges and deals elemental damage over 9 seconds.
This passive noticeably buffs Ravage to make it part of the core rotation despite it being the only rotational ability other than Battering Assault (needed for its Rage generation) to be used that does NOT generate Fury or contribute to reducing the cooldowns of Obliterate and Raging Burst.
Fury - Activating an attack that spends Rage and defeating opponents builds Fury. When 30 stacks of Fury are built, you become Furious, enabling the use of Berserk, Predation and Bloodthirst.
Fury is the unique Marauder resource that powers Berserk and Bloodthirst. The Relentless utility should always be taken whenever Predation is needed to ensure it does not consume Fury.
Enraged Slash - Vicious Slash, Sweeping Slash, Vicious Throw, Massacre, Annihilate, and Furious Strike refund 1 Rage when used. Also, Battering Assault beats down its target for 45 seconds. Beat Down targets take 5% more damage from melee attacks.
This passive causes a disconnect between the Rage required to activate the ability versus the Rage consumed by the ability. For example, Vicious Slash requires 3 Rage to be able to activate the ability but it will only use 2 Rage.
Short Fuse - Increases the amount of Fury built by 2 when activating abilities that consume Rage, and reduces the cooldown of Frenzy by 30 seconds.
This passive is helpful in that it effectively doubles the rate of generating Fury and the frequency of Berserk being available.
Gearing in 6.0
Gearing Stat Allocation
Please see my Gearing Guide for a detailed overview of gearing in 6.x in SWTOR. Please also see my Alacrity Guide for a much more in-depth look at alacrity.
For Fury Marauder, I gear as follows:
Set Bonus: Descent of the Fearless
Tactical: Cauterized Coronary
Amplifiers: Armor Penetration
Mods: Unlettered Lethal Mods
Relics: Devastating Vengeance & Primeval Fatesealer (Serendipitous Assault & Focused Retribution for Dxun/PVP)
Stim: Proficient
Adrenal: Critical (Attack for Dxun only)
For Fury Marauder, I allocate my tertiary stats as follows:
Accuracy: 1,585 - 1,630 (anything outside this approximate range and I usually try to re-optimize by swapping around enhancements and augments)
Alacrity: around 1,400 (at least 1,895 if the Zeal guild perk applies)
Critical: all remaining tertiary points go into Critical
Shield: None
Absorb: None
Set Bonus
Descent of the Fearless
Increased drop rate from daily missions.
(2) +2% Mastery
(4) Whenever you gain or use a Furious Power ability charge while in combat, your damage is increased by 10% for 10 seconds.
(6) Dealing damage has a 10% chance to build a Furious Power ability charge. Can only occur once every 5 seconds.
Analysis: The only set bonus that is BIS across multiple advanced classes, Descent of the Fearless is BIS for all Juggernaut and Marauder DPS disciplines. The set bonus should provide fairly high uptime on a straight 10% damage buff.
The 10% damage buff lasts for 10 seconds and can be refreshed by generating a charge or using a charge. Generating a charge via the 6 piece set bonus triggers a 5 second cooldown before it can trigger again, though it only has a 10% chance to do so after the cooldown and only 2-3 GCDs to trigger and ensure it is refreshed before expiration.
Given the low chance, there is a decent probability that the typical rotation will not have full uptime of the 10% damage buff without careful attention by the player. These changes are improved significantly by the Bloody Slashes DoT applied by Ravage and the Cauterized Coronary DoT (requires the tactical item of the same name) applied by Furious Strike. One DoT has partial uptime and the second has full uptime, so combined they provide multiple additional chances to trigger the set bonus and provide additional 25% ability damage buffs and better and more consistent uptime of the 10% overall damage buff.
Skilled players will have to decide between two approaches to a rotation and their use of Furious Power. They can use Furious Power each rotation on Furious Strike as recommended below. This ensures the 25% damage buff is applied to the heaviest hitting ability and any additional charges affect Obliterate as next ability in the rotation and another heavy hitting ability, but risks some downtime on the 10% damage buff. I recommend this approach since it is simpler and easier to remember/execute in a stressful boss encounter.
The second option is to prioritize using Furious Power when the 10% damage buff is about to expire to maintain its uptime. This approach is difficult to implement because it requires far more attention on the player’s buff bar and likely is a DPS loss because it will apply the 25% damage buff to filler abilities in some instances rather than the core abilities of Furious Strike, and Obliterate.
Impact on Rotation: Only utilize Furious Power charges on Furious Strike. It is the highest damaging eligible ability in the rotation. This also ensures that if multiple charges are available they will buff Obliterate as well.
Given the rate limit for generating charges of Furious Power, it should not be possible to cap on charges between uses of Furious Strike. If a charge is not available when Furious Strike comes off cooldown, it is fine to use it on Obliterate. Otherwise, save the charge for the next rotation cycle.
When to Take: All situations. Descent of the Fearless is easily the BIS set bonus for all Sith Warrior disciplines. It particularly synergizes with the Cauterized Coronary tactical item, as the additional DoT will provide additional chances to trigger the 6 piece set bonus and generate additional stacks of Furious Power.
Tactical Items
Cauterized Coronary
Increased drop rate from operations.
Furious Strike causes its targets to burn.
Analysis: The Cauterized Coronary DoT has a 9 second duration. Furious Strike has a 12 second duration but should always be usable every 9 seconds / 6 GCDs due to the Rout passive ability. Thus, the DoT should have full uptime in any encounter without target swapping.
The full uptime DoT provides really strong synergy with the Descent of the Fearless set bonus, as each tick provides additional opportunities to trigger charges of Furious Power that provide more uptime of an overall 10% damage buff and can buff individual damage abilities by 25%.
Impact on Rotation: N/A no change in rotation is necessary.
When to Take: Any encounters that prioritize single target DPS. It can be swapped out for Enrage Crush in high AoE DPS situations, though only for encounters where there will be consistent (nearly constant) opportunities for AoE DPS.
Perseverance
Increased drop rate from daily missions.
Using Obliterate with Furious Power causes it to critically hit and increases your critical strike chance by 20% for 2 seconds.
Analysis: This tactical seems to be designed with burst DPS in mind and particularly PVP. Fury provides high burst DPS capability in the front half of its rotation. Raging Burst should be a guaranteed crit and get buffed damage, Strike has the highest base damage for the discipline, and Obliterate does less damage than those two but still very high damage overall.
By making Obliterate an auto-crit when using Furious Power, it offers the potential for most rotations to have a 3 GCD window with 2 guaranteed critical hits and the discipline’s strongest base ability. Combined with the 2 GCD duration 20% critical chance buff, it makes the discipline's burst hit very hard.
In comparing it to Cauterized Coronary, the consistent additional DoT damage should significantly outperform incremental additional critical damage from Obliterate. Thus in any sustained DPS situation Perseverance may be sub-optimal but will be better in situations where burst DPS is most important.
Also, the tactical imposes an opportunity cost with regards to the use of Furious Power. Absent this tactical, that buff should always be used on Furious Strike as it has higher overall damage, is already a guaranteed critical hit and has its damage buffed 30% rotationally. Changing its use is a DPS loss prior to the guaranteed crit buff and the associated increase in “super crit” bonus damage. Overall it is still a DPS increase but it is watered down a bit due to this trade-off.
Impact on Rotation: Only change is to only use Furious Power prior to Obliterate. If multiple charges are available, its use can be moved earlier in the rotation 1 GCD for every charge above 1 (e.g., 2 charges means it can be used 1 GCD earlier, and so on).
When to Take: For single target DPS if burst DPS is preferred for PVE or PVP, otherwise take Cauterized Coronary.
Enrage Crush
Increased drop rate from flashpoints.
Raging Burst and Smash detonate Force Crush, dealing Force Crush's remaining damage to up to 8 enemies in an area around the primary target.
Analysis: This tactical provides a straightforward AoE DPS increase to the discipline. The rotation should use Force Crush every other 6 GCD cycle, so every other Raging Burst or Smash should trigger a powerful AoE damage effect.
In AoE situations the player should always be using Smash instead of Raging Burst, as it benefits from all the same buffs but is an AoE damage ability. After its first use in the opener, it should be a guaranteed crit and deal 30% more damage via rotational buffs.
Also worth noting is that Force Crush should always be followed immediately by Raging Burst or Smash per the rotation discussion below. This rotation synergizes with the tactical to provide the greatest possible AoE DPS due to minimizing the damage done by Force Crush prior to triggering the AoE burst.
Combined with dealing all of Force Crush’s ability instantly and the inherent buffs to Smash, this combo arguably provides Fury with the strongest possible AoE damage within a single GCD in the entire game.
Impact on Rotation: N/A. The rotation should be used normally as per below, except that this tactical will cause a sizable AoE effect every other use of Smash (as that is what should be used in AoE situations over Raging Burst).
When to Take: Encounters with heavy sustained AoE requirements, such as Hard Mode Hive Queen or several bosses in Nature of Progress (Dxun).
Force Barter
Increased drop rate from flashpoints.
Furious Strike refunds one additional rage after it hits but refunds all its rage if you have fallen to zero.
Analysis: This tactical sounds interesting but in practice provides very little benefit. Reducing the energy cost of an ability by 1 is a very minimal benefit, as over the course of an encounter it might allow a few uses of a higher damage filler ability instead of a free filler or basic attack. The power of this tactical lies in its potential to make Furious Strike free via a full refund of its energy cost.
Even assuming the rotation can be managed in that fashion without it otherwise being a DPS loss, the problem remains of what to do with the extra 5 energy. The rotation is fairly stable from an energy perspective so long as Berserk is used every other rotation cycle. The extra energy could enable swapping Vicious Slash as a filler for a higher energy ability, but there is not one available. Force Push, Force Stasis and Dual Saber Throw have no energy cost. Vicious Throw is an option but only sub-30% boss health. That leaves the player often with extra energy that will eventually be capped and wasted in most instances.
Impact on Rotation: N/A not recommended.
When to Take: N/A not recommended.
Amplifiers
Armor Penetration (or secondarily, Weapon Expertise)
The discipline’s abilities almost exclusively deal kinetic or energy damage, except for internal damage by DoTs Bloody Slashes and the Cauterized Coronary tactical. The attacks are fairly even balanced between using Force type attacks and Weapon type attacks. As noted, the discipline has some DoT damage.
Armor Penetration amplifiers provide the highest boost to their stat as compared to Weapon Expertise (weapon type attacks), Force Sensitivity (Force type attacks) or Periodic Intensity (DoTs). However, since armor penetration only increases damage by reducing the amount absorbed by enemy armor, it’s buff to DPS is usually a bit lower per item piece than the other options. Thus, it typically will only be optimal for disciplines like Fury where nearly all abilities deal kinetic or energy damage.
If attempting to synergize a Descent of the Fearless set of gear between Sith Warrior DPS disciplines, Weapon Expertise is likely the best option as it provides either the best or usually second best DPS boost for nearly all disciplines.
Key Abilities
Furious Power NEW IN 6.0 - Consumes all ability charges and applies Furious Power stacks to you. Each stack increases your next direct single target melee attack by 25% and is consumed whenever you deal damage with these attacks. Recharges 1 ability charge every 30 seconds.
A new offensive cooldown, it can be used in the opener to buff you heaviest hitting ability for +100% damage or used every ~30 seconds to buff an ability damage +25%. With the Descent of the Fearless set bonus, it also provides a +10% damage buff and can generate extra charges during combat.
Berserk (costs 30 Fury, no cooldown) - Requires and converts 30 stacks of Fury to enter a Berserk state, instantly generating 4 Rage, plus 8 additional Rage over the next few seconds.
Berserk is a unique off-GCD offensive cooldown to Marauders that provides different effects for each Marauder discipline. For Fury, Berserk is immensely important due to it being needed every 12 GCDs to proc the Destruction passive ability to make Raging Burst free and buffed +15% damage. See below for discussion on using Berserk under rotation.
Raging Burst (3 Rage, 12s cooldown, range 10m) Blasts the target with a powerful burst of Force energy, dealing high kinetic damage.
When the Fury rotation is played optimally, Raging Burst is the most powerful ability of the discipline. Receiving buffs from Obliterate, Furious Strike, and Destruction, each use of Raging Burst should not cost Rage, be a guaranteed crit, and get +30% damage. Despite the cooldown of 12s / 8 GCDs, it should be utilized every 6 GCDs to align with the cooldown of Furious Strike, with various abilities reducing its cooldown via the Rout passive ability.
Smash (3 Rage, 12s cooldown, range 10m) - Blasts the target with a powerful burst of Force energy, dealing high kinetic damage and to any nearby enemies.
An AoE equivalent of Raging Burst. It receives all of the same buffs.
Obliterate (2 Rage, 12s cooldown, range 10m) - Leaps to a target, dealing moderate weapon damage and immobilizing the target for 1 second. Can be used while immobilized.
Obliterate is incredibly useful in PVP for being useable while immobilized, giving Marauders two leaping abilities. In PVE content, Obliterate does good damage and provides two critical buffs. The Battle Cry passive buffs Force Scream to deal +5% damage and generate rather than consume Rage (while still generating Fury), while Dominate makes the next Force Sweep a guaranteed crit. It also is relatively inexpensive in Rage (costing 1 net Rage after the Enraged Slash passive) and generates 4 Fury when not under the effects of Berserk. It should be utilized every 6 GCDs to ensure each Raging Burst is buffed.
Furious Strike (5 Rage, 9s cooldown, range 4m) - Slices the target for high weapon damage.
Prior to any buffs, Furious Strike has the highest base damage for Fury. After all buffs are considered, it is the second highest damaging ability after Raging Burst. Furious Strike’s cooldown of 9s / 6 GCDs is the baseline for the Fury rotation. The ability also buffs Raging Burst to deal 15% more damage and builds 4 Fury.
Force Crush (3 Rage, 18s cooldown, range 10m) - Progressively slows the target from 50% to 5% movement speed over 3 seconds and deals low kinetic damage each second. At the end of the duration, the target is crushed and takes additional kinetic damage.
Force Crush does decent damage but is most notable for proccing Destruction, making the next Raging Burst free. It should also be used on cooldown.
Cloak of Pain (free, 1 minute cooldown) - Reduces all damage taken by 20% and deals low energy damage to attackers. This effect cannot occur more than once every second. Lasts 10 seconds. Cloak of Pain refreshes to its full duration when attacked, but this effect cannot last more than 30 seconds in total.
Cloak of Pain is a unique ability for Marauders that serves as both a defensive cooldown and provides a low level of reflect damage to attackers. It can be buffed in a variety of ways through utilities. Be aware of how it works and in which operations to use it (and when to do so), as skillful use of Cloak of Pain is a big part of reaching elite levels of DPS as a Marauder.
Force Charge (free, 15s cooldown, range 10-30m) - Jumps to a distant target, dealing low damage with the main-hand weapon, immobilizing the target for 2 seconds and interrupting the target’s current action. Builds 3 Rage.
Force Charge is the Sith Warrior (Juggernaut & Marauder) gap closer and also serves to generate Rage. It also functions as an interrupt. Use any time needed to get into melee range and generate Rage. It does very little damage so is not generally worth stepping outside of melee range to leap, except when an additional interrupt is needed. Notable for Fury, Force Charge should NEVER be used if Obliterate is available, as Obliterate provides buffs Raging Burst to be a guaranteed crit and generates 4 Fury instead of Force Charge’s 2 Fury.
Battering Assault (free, 15s cooldown, range 4m) - Strikes the target multiples times with both lightsabers, dealing low weapon damage and building 6 Rage.
Marauder’s main Rage building ability. Fury has a very tight Rage management rotation, which should use Battering Assault every 18s / 12 GCDs.
Ravage (free, 18s cooldown, range 4m) - Performs a series of lightsaber attacks that deal moderate weapon damage.
Ravage is a free filler ability and does strong damage via the Bloody Slashes passive ability. It should also be used nearly on cooldown in the Fury rotation.
Force Scream (3 Rage, 12s cooldown, range 10m) - Deals moderate weapon damage.
Force Scream is a semi-ranged ability that is used in the Fury rotation due to the Battle Cry buff applied by Force Charge or Obliterate. The buff grants +5% damage to Force Scream and makes generate 1 Rage instead of consuming Rage. Despite this change, Force Scream still generates Fury.
Vicious Throw (3 Rage, 10s cooldown, range 10m) - Throws the main-hand lightsaber at a target, dealing high energy damage. Only usable on targets at or below 30% max health.
Vicious Throw is a strong execute ability and can be utilized above 30% boss health via a utility. It can be substituted for Vicious Slash in the rotation whenever it is available.
Dual Saber Throw (free, 18s cooldown, ranged 30m) - Throws both lightsabers in a straight line towards the target, dealing moderate weapon damage to up to 8 enemies directly in front of you up to 30 meters away. Affected enemies are slowed by 50% for 6 seconds.
This ability is not used in the core Fury rotation. While it deals good damage, it does not generate Fury. As such, using it regularly will cause rotational issues where Berserk will not be available quickly enough to use for every other Raging Burst.
Vicious Slash (3 Rage, no cooldown, range 4m) - Slashes the target for moderate weapon damage.
Vicious Slash is a straight forward spammable filler. As it generates 4 Fury and is effective in reducing the cooldown of Obliterate and Raging Burst, it is used as a filler in the Fury rotation.
Assault (free, no cooldown, range 4m) - Inflicts low weapon damage with a series of quick melee attacks. Generates 2 Rage.
Assault should not be used in the Fury rotation at all if possible. While it does serve to reduce the cooldown of Raging Burst and Obliterate, since it does not consume Rage it does not generate Fury.
Rotation
Rotation Priority Analysis
The Fury Marauder rotation is relatively fixed in order to achieve its priorities to maximize DPS. Those priorities are:
1. Use Obliterate, Raging Burst and Furious Strike on cooldown. Obliterate and Furious Strike have powerful synergies that buff Raging Burst, collectively granting +15% damage and a 100% critical chance. Furious Strike also provides a +5% damage buff. These abilities need to be used as often as possible and on the same cooldown.
2. Raging Burst should always benefit from Destruction. Berserk and Force Crush both grant the Destruction buff, which makes the next Raging Burst free and grants +15% damage. Force Crush has a 12 GCD cooldown. Furious Strike has a 6 GCD cooldown, and per #1 we want to be utilizing Raging Burst as often as Furious Strike so every 6 GCDs. Thus, Force Crush can buff every other 6 GCD rotational use of Raging Burst. We need Berserk to cover the other alternating use of Raging Burst.
3. Generate 30 Fury every 12 GCDs. Per #1 and #2, we know we need to use Berserk every 12 GCDs so that Berserk can provide the Destruction buff to make Raging Burst free. Berserk is also critical to the energy management in the rotation by providing 12 Rage (4 instant and 8 generated over 4 GCDs). Per the passive ability description, Fury is generated by abilities that consume Rage. The Fury abilities generate the following amount of Fury:
Ravage - 5 Fury
Raging Burst OR Smash - 4 Fury
Furious Strike - 4 Fury
Obliterate - 4 Fury
Force Crush - 4 Fury
Force Scream - 4 Fury (note that due to a passive, Force Scream generates 4 Fury even when buffed by Obliterate via the Battle Cry passive to generate Rage instead of consuming it.)
Vicious Throw - 4 Fury
Vicious Slash - 4 Fury
Force Charge - 2 Fury
Battering Assault - 0 Fury
Dual Saber Throw - 0 Fury
Assault - 0 Fury
It is also important to understand that during Berserk’s effects (i.e., the 4 GCDs that Berserk is generating Rage), no Fury can be generated. Since Berserk is instant and thus it can be activated in the same GCD as the ability that generated 30th stack of Fury, the duration is effectively reduced to 3 GCDs. Thus, we need to generate 30 stacks of Fury in 9 GCDs. Of the abilities listed above, all generate at least 4 Fury except (1) Force Charge, which isn’t used outside of the opener; (2) Battering Assault, which is necessary to use rotationally for Rage generation; and (3) Assault, which should never be used anyway.
So, this leaves us with a rotation where 8 out of 9 GCDs after Berserk need to generate Fury to ensure Berserk can be used on a 12 GCD cooldown, with Battering Assault taking the 9th GCD for Rage generation.
4. Fillers should be Ravage, Force Scream and Vicious Slash only. All three abilities receive buffs from the Fury skill tree and generate 4-5 Fury. Ravage applies a fire DoT via Bloody Slashes. Force Scream is buffed +5% damage and generates 1 Rage via Battle Cry) and generate 4-5 Fury. Finally, Vicious Slash is buffed to deal additional damage by Force Flagellation.
So what about Dual Saber Throw, you ask? It does not meet the height requirement to ride the Fury train. While it deals good damage and is free, it deals less damage than these buffed abilities and fails to generate Fury. Per #3 above, building Fury is hugely important to the rotation so Dual Saber Throw doesn’t get a spot.
So how do we fit this into a rotation? Per the above, we know that the rotation needs to be 12 GCDs that are split into 2 blocks of 6 GCDs. Each block needs to use Obliterate, Raging Burst and Furious Strike. The 6 GCD blocks should alternate between using Berserk off-GCD and using Force Crush. We also want to use Force Scream and Ravage once each per 12 GCD cycle to take advantage of their buffs. We also need to use Battering Assault once per 12 GCD cycle for Rage management. Finally, we can fill any gaps with Vicious Slash as a filler.
To re-count, that is Raging Burst x2, Furious Strike x2, Obliterate x2, Furious Strike x1, Force Scream x1, Ravage x1, Battering Assault x1, and Vicious Slash x2. That gets us to 12 GCDs.
So finally, let’s get to the opener and base rotation. It’s important to note there is just one small change between the opener and the base rotation due to prioritizing DPS abilities up front to fit into raid buff and relic proc windows.
Basic Opener
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Pre-fight Regen to build 30 stacks of Fury.
Force Charge Marauder’s gap closer, Force Charge also grants Battle Cry to buff Force Scream.
Berserk OFF GCD Berserk is used here to generate Rage and proc Destruction to make Raging Burst free. An alternative is to use Force Crush very early in the opener. That said, it isn’t the highest DPS ability so using it early isn’t advantageous. Force Crush also costs Rage and thus would need to be paired with Battering Assault to work, which would further depress DPS.
Frenzy OFF GCD We usually want to use Bloodthirst early in the opener so need 30 more stacks of Fury. If using Bloodthirst on pulling isn’t desirable (i.e., saving for execute phase if fight is less than 5 minutes, or certain fights like Raptus, Draxus, Brontes, or other fights where early phase DPS isn’t important, save Frenzy as an emergency cooldown if you mess up your Fury generation and need to use Berserk.
Bloodthirst OFF GCD
Adrenal OFF GCD DPS boost for opener, need to hit here before going through all the big hitting DPS abilities.
Furious Power OFF GCD Used here to apply the Descent of the Fearless set bonus +10% overall damage buff and apply 4 Furious Power charges to buff our initial damage abilities.
Ravage
Raging Burst Used first to take advantage of Dominate (procced by Force Charge) that makes Raging Burst a guaranteed crit. There is an argument to be made that Furious Strike should be used first since it would provide Furious Rage and buff Raging Burst’s damage by a further 15%. However, Raging Burst provides a better DPS buff via Cascading Power that increases all damage by 5% for 6 seconds. Thus, it is optimal to use Raging Burst first, though for all subsequent Raging Bursts will benefit from the incremental 15% damage buff.
Furious Strike Benefiting from the 5% damage buff from Raging Burst, Furious Strike finishes the incredibly strong 1-2 combo for Fury. It also provides a buff for the next Raging Burst and adds a defense buff.
Force Scream Used in this slot to maximize the burst DPS window.
Obliterate Leap provides the Dominate buff to make the next Raging Burst a guaranteed crit, procs Battle Cry to buff the next Force Scream, and deals additional strong damage to round out the end of big initial burst window.
Battering Assault Used here to ensure we have adequate Rage for the next 6 GCD cycle.
Force Crush The end of the first 6 GCD block, Force Crush provides Destruction for the next cycle.
Raging Burst Same GCD slot as previous 6 GCD cycle, should be off cooldown and fully buffed (free, +30% damage, 100% crit)
Furious Power OFF GCD The previous charges should have been consumed by this point so we re-apply Furious Power to buff Furious Strike.
Furious Strike Same GCD slot as previous 6 GCD cycle, benefits from 5% damage buff from Raging Burst
Vicious Slash Filler slot
Obliterate Same GCD slot as previous 6 GCD cycle, procs Dominate and Battle Cry
Force Scream Force Scream is used again at the end of the opener to maximize overall burst. It will not be used in this slot again.
Berserk OFF GCD Berserk must be used as close to instantly after activating Force Scream as possible.
Ravage End of the opener and 12th GCD in the overall cycle
(continue with core rotation)
Basic Rotation (# of Fury)
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{note that the first two abilities will be under the effects of Berserk, all buffs from end of previous rotation)
Raging Burst (0) Strongest hitting ability, should always be fully buffed by previous cycle to be free, 100% critical chance, and +30% damage, provides +5% damage for 6s
Furious Power + Furious Strike (0) Next strongest ability, buffs next Raging Burst +15% damage
Vicious Slash (4) Filler spot, generating Fury
Obliterate (8) Procs Dominate (next Raging Burst 100% crit) and Battle Cry (Force Scream +5% damage and +1 Rage)
Battering Assault (8) Rage generation
Force Crush (12) Procs Destruction to make next Raging Burst free
Raging Burst (16) Biggest hitter, see above, using on cooldown
Furious Power + Furious Strike (20) Next biggest hitter, see above, using on cooldown
Force Scream (24) Buffed and used on nearly on cooldown
Obliterate (28) Procs Dominate and Battle Cry, using on cooldown
Vicious Slash (30) Now are capped at 30 Fury and ready to hit Berserk
Berserk + Ravage (0) Note that we cap at 30 Fury upon activation, and should immediately hit Berserk before the GCD ends and then use Ravage to end the cycle
Advanced Rotation Analysis
All of the analysis for the Basic Rotation is all still valid. The key thing to consider here is whether there is a simpler way to think about the rotation to deliver greater DPS and more consistent availability of Berserk.
The key goals here are (1) always have Berserk available when we need it; (2) more optimal use of fillers; and (3) higher and more consistent DPS.
I had been thinking for a while that a more optimal rotation would spread out the use of our core discipline abilities Obliterate, Raging Burst and Furious Strike. Spreading them out makes it easier to use Force Scream on cooldown as our most powerful filler.
Another key part of the discipline that is not always super apparent is that Ravage builds Fury even during Berserk. The Basic Rotation above leverages this by using Ravage at the end of each rotation cycle right after Berserk. However, it should be simpler to think about the rotation as beginning with Berserk + Ravage, right?
Well these thoughts were bouncing around in my head a bit but I had not gotten around to tinkering with it. Thankfully, my good friend Zaro (aka KhazadSanci in Discord) shared a rotation with me that I really really like. I am not entirely certain who first introduced it but do want to acknowledge it was not something I came up with, but rather something I tested and decided I greatly prefer it since it accomplishes the goals stated above.
The changes to the rotation are two-fold:
Move Berserk + Ravage to the beginning of the rotation. This is just an organizational change but I find it helps me to remember where I am in the rotation. Ravage has a cooldown that lasts for two full rotation blocks of 12 GCDs which is just long enough for a rotation to remember without being too complicated.
Space out Obliterate, Raging Burst and Furious Strike by 1 GCD. As noted above, this spacing lets us more efficiently use Force Scream on cooldown. This change helps our damage since Force Scream is a great filler ability but also helps our Rage and Fury generation since Force Scream will usually generate Rage instead of spending it due to the Battle Cry passive ability and will generate Fury. This contributes to having a much more reliable Berserk when we need it, whereas with the Basic Rotation I have found Berserk is a bit less reliable if you make a mistake.
Advanced Opener
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Pre-fight Regen to build 30 stacks of Fury.
Force Charge Marauder's gap closer, Force Charge also grants Battle Cry to buff Force Scream. However, since we use Obliterate before Force Scream in the Advanced Rotation and Obliterate also provides the Battle Cry passive buff, we do not need Force Charge so it can be skipped for parsing or where it is convenient to run in.
Berserk OFF GCD Berserk is used here to generate Rage and proc Destruction to make Raging Burst free.
Frenzy OFF GCD Use here so we have Fury to activate Bloodthirst.
Bloodthirst OFF GCD
Adrenal OFF GCD DPS boost for opener, need to hit here before going through all the big hitting DPS abilities.
Furious Power OFF GCD An off-GCD ability provided in 6.0, Furious Power will apply our Descent of the Fearless +10% damage buff and will apply its 4 pre-built charges to buff the next 4 applicable damage abilities by 25%. This initial use with 4 charges should buff the next two Furious Strikes, Ravage and Obliterate. Force Scream and Raging Burst are Force attacks and thus will not be buffed by Furious Power.
Furious Strike Although the Advanced Rotation begins normally with Ravage, the cooldown works out that we can use Furious Strike first for some early burst damage and it will be off cooldown on time later. Apart from this change and using offensive cooldowns in the opener, this is essentially the only change when comparing the Advanced Opener to the Advanced Rotation.
Ravage Ravage begins our Advanced Rotation and starts the core rotation after using Furious Strike to jump start our burst damage. It builds Fury during Berserk and applies a DoT early that helps us get additional stacks of Furious Power.
Obliterate Obliterate provides the Dominate buff that makes the next Raging Burst a guaranteed critical hit and procs Battle Cry to buff Force Scream to be net energy positive as a high damage filler.
Force Scream Net positive to energy due to the Battle Cry passive, we use Force Scream as our top priority filler.
Raging Burst Raging Burst is a guaranteed critical hit in the Advanced Opener due to Obliterate being used first and thus not needing Force Charge as compared to the Basic Opener. This use is free due to Destruction being applied by Berserk.
Force Crush We used Force Crush right after Raging Burst to re-apply the Destruction buff so the next Raging Burst is also free.
Furious Strike Our top damaging ability that should consume our last stack from the initial use of Furious Power.
Vicious Slash Filler ability that takes priority with Force Scream on cooldown.
Obliterate Use on cooldown
Battering Assault Our second time through the core rotation we do not have energy generation from Berserk so need Battering Assault here instead.
Raging Burst Use on cooldown
Force Scream Priority filler ability that should be off cooldown by now. It should always be buffed and glowing from Force Scream's Battle Cry passive buff.
Furious Power OFF GCD We generally want to save Furious Power's charges to buff Furious Strike as often as possible. It deals the most damage per activation of any ability for the discipline. The only ability that is close in damage is Raging Burst but as a Force attack it is not eligible for Furious Power's buff. If you are running a 1.4s GCD for parsing then this activation takes place 12 GCDs or 16.8 seconds since we last used Furious Power. We want to make sure we keep 100% uptime on Furious Power's +10% overall damage buff at all costs, so if necessary Furious Power should be used earlier. Most of the time you should get 1 or maybe even 2 stacks of Furious Power generated from attacks during the intervening time to reset the 10 second timer. You can safely use Furious Power after Battering Assault to save the buff for Furious Strike, since Raging Burst and Force Scream will not consume the buff.
Furious Strike Last ability in the opener, always used on cooldown.
(continue with Advanced Rotation beginning with Berserk > Ravage)
Advanced Rotation
Please note that a full rotation should be defined based on one use of Ravage until it comes off cooldown again. However, the nature of the rotation and ability cooldowns is such that two rotations (i.e., two uses of Ravage and its full cooldown) will repeat infinitely, so they are displayed here to show the "full rotation" that can be repeated as needed.
First Rotation
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Berserk OFF GCD Provide Rage for first rotation block
Ravage Filler that leads off our rotation, generates Fury during Berserk
Obliterate Proc Dominate to make Raging Burst an auto-crit and Battle Cry to buff Force Scream
Force Scream Filler used now that Battle Cry has been applied
Raging Burst Big hitting damage ability, free due to Berserk applying Destruction buff
Force Crush Used after Raging Burst to apply Destruction buff for next rotation block
Furious Power + Furious Strike End of first block, buffing our strongest ability with Furious Power
Vicious Slash Filler and Force Scream is on cooldown so Vicious Slash instead
Obliterate Use on cooldown
Battering Assault We do not have energy generation from Berserk this rotation block so need Battering Assault
Raging Burst Use on cooldown
Force Scream Use in filler spot whenever it is available and off cooldown
Furious Power + Furious Strike End of first block, buffing our strongest ability with Furious Power
Second Rotation
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Berserk OFF GCD Provide Rage for first rotation block
Ravage Filler that leads off our rotation, generates Fury during Berserk
Obliterate Proc Dominate to make Raging Burst an auto-crit and Battle Cry to buff Force Scream
Vicious Slash Filler and Force Scream is on cooldown so Vicious Slash instead
Raging Burst Big hitting damage ability, free due to Berserk applying Destruction buff
Force Crush Used after Raging Burst to apply Destruction buff for next rotation block
Furious Power + Furious Strike End of first block, buffing our strongest ability with Furious Power
Force Scream Use in filler spot whenever it is available and off cooldown
Obliterate Use on cooldown
Battering Assault We do not have energy generation from Berserk this rotation block so need Battering Assault
Raging Burst Use on cooldown
Vicious Slash Filler and Force Scream is on cooldown so Vicious Slash instead
Furious Power + Furious Strike End of first block, buffing our strongest ability with Furious Power
So what changes between these rotations? Not much.
We have to use Force Crush and Battering Assault every 12 GCD rotation and due to the energy generation from Berserk we need Battering Assault around GCD #10 and thus Force Crush needs to be in GCD #6.
This leaves us with fillers in GCDs 4, 8 and 12. The priority here is Force Scream when it's available and Vicious Slash otherwise. Pretty simple.
Execute Phase & Vicious Throw
How does Vicious Throw factor into the Fury rotation?
Simple! It replaces Vicious Slash anytime it is off cooldown and available. Both abilities have an identical energy cost so it has no impact on your rotation.
Use of Furious Power
As of 6.0, Furious Power is a very important off GCD ability to consider in the discipline.
If you have a full 6 piece Descent of the Fearless set bonus (and if you don't, you should), then the set bonus provides a 10% overall damage buff and can generate additional charges of Furious Power. Furious Power itself provides a 25% damage buff to the next single target melee attack. Only 1 charge can be used at a time so if you use Furious Power with multiple stacks then it will automatically consume 1 stack per eligible ability until the charges as of its activation are all consumed.
This set bonus and the new Furious Power ability provides somewhere around a 15% or greater increase in DPS between the high uptime on the 10% damage buff and frequent and strategic use of Furious Power and its 25% buff to single ability damage.
For the Fury discipline the key question becomes how often and when to use Furious Power. We have two goals for Furious Power in the rotation:
Use Furious Power's 25% single ability damage buff on our strongest damage abilities
Keep our uptime on the 10% overall damage as high as possible
These two goals can conflict at times, so let's briefly discuss.
Furious Power only applies to melee attacks. SWTOR classifies attacking abilities as either Force, Tech, Melee or Ranged attacks. For Fury Marauder, Furious Power buffs Furious Strike, Obliterate, Ravage, Battering Assault and Vicious Slash. Furious Power does NOT buff Raging Burst, Force Crush or Force Scream and so these abilities can be used after activating Furious Strike without consuming a charge.
So of our eligible abilities, Furious Strike is by far our strongest damage ability. Thus to achieve our first goal we should try to buff Furious Strike as often as possible, which will usually mean hitting Furious Power right before Furious Strike or sometimes activating a few GCDs earlier if the preceding abilities will not consume the buff.
Now to the second goal, how do we maintain nearly 100% uptime on the overall 10% damage buff? To start, let's first note that the 10% damage buff is applied/refreshed upon either using Furious Power or generating a stack of Furious Power. The Descent of the Fearless set bonus gives a 10% chance to generate a stack of Furious Power each time we deal damage though it has a 5 second cooldown on this trigger. Furious Power normally generates 1 stack every 30 seconds.
So in the simplest case we know we will get 10 seconds out of every 30 seconds with the buff active since we get 1 stack every 30 seconds as long as we do not cap at the maximum of 4 stacks of Furious Power. If we use Furious Power at least 10 seconds after we get the first stack then we get another 10 seconds of uptime. So at a minimum we should be able to achieve 67% (20 / 30 seconds) uptime. How do we do better?
Well the 10% chance to trigger extra Furious Power stacks helps us a lot here. The key to getting plenty of stacks of Furious Power are the DoTs applied by Ravage, Furious Strike (via the Cauterized Coronary tactical) and Force Crush. Those provide extra ticks of damage that can trigger our set bonus on top of the damage dealt by our actual abilities. Ravage is also great in that it deals multiple ticks of damage per activation so is more likely than most abilities to trigger the set bonus. Finally, many abilities in the discipline deal damage with both the mainhand and offhand so have a higher actual base chance than the stated 10% proc rate.
All of this combines to mean that most of the time you should have more than enough charges of Furious Power to achieve goal #1 to always buff Furious Strike while still achieving goal #2 and reaching very high (>95% and usually >98%) uptime on the 10% damage buff.
So this is hopefully helpful background information, but you are probably wondering where is the actual advice on how to do it? Here it comes...
Use Furious Power prior to Furious Strike.
Simple. The basics are really simple though I discuss below some additional nuance for the min-maxers (and there is probably some min-max nuance I am missing/forgetting). Furious Strike does the most damage so we always want to buff it. It has a 6 GCD cooldown that works out to 7.8 seconds with a 1.3s GCD or 8.4 seconds with a 1.4s GCD, so this keeps us well within the 10s duration to keep full uptime. The only tricky part comes if RNG is unkind to us and we do not proc set bonus every 5-8 seconds as we will usually do and get to Furious Strike without an available charge of Furious Power.
Some additional thoughts:
If RNG is mean to you and you do not have a Furious Power charge for Furious Strike what do you do? I usually wait until the next Furious Strike. I should proc another charge by then and it will restart the 10 second timer so I don't need to panic and hit it as soon as I get the stack.
How early can I use Furious Power to buff Furious Strike? Recall that Raging Burst, Force Scream and Force Crush do not consumer a Furious Power charge but the other abilities do. If you look at the Advanced Rotation above you will see that most of the time you will have 2 or sometimes 3 preceding abilities (Raging Burst, Force Scream, Force Crush) that do not consume a charge so you can use it quite early. On occasion you will need to use Vicious Slash right before Furious Strike and then should wait until just before activating Furious Strike.
When should you use Furious Power to not buff Furious Strike? When the 10% damage buff is about to expire. If I see the buff is about to expire then I feel it's better to buff a sub-optimal ability by 25% then let the 10% buff drop off. In practice this is pretty rare though so I feel most players should stick to just using it right before Furious Strike for simplicity unless they are running very challenging Veteran or Master Mode operations or Ranked PVP.
Use of Berserk
It is important to note that on a dummy parse, the speed of activating Vicious Slash then immediately hitting Berserk is critical to the success of the rotation. Since there is no excess room in the Fury generation in the rotation, delaying Berserk too long will lead to it not being available when Raging Burst is off cooldown. This can happen where the delay causes Berserk to overlap another GCD and prevent it from generating Fury.
In such a case, I would recommend using an extra Vicious Slash to proc Berserk then resume the rotation. Fury frequently caps Rage so that won’t be an issue, and it is far better to simply delay the abilities 1 GCD then compromise your entire rotation.
It is also worth noting that in a live ops environment that the timing will not generally need to be as precise. The Brazen utility should be taken on all fights and will frequently grant some free Fury to help provide a little more margin for error on having Berserk available when needed.
Defensive Abilities
Marauders have a strong arsenal of defensive cooldowns and abilities. Compared to the other Sith Warrior advanced class, the Sith Juggernaut, Marauders require a bit more skill to take full advantage of their defensive abilities. Nevertheless, when played well Marauders can mitigate significant damage and in many cases return damage to the enemy.
Cloak of Pain (1 minute cooldown) - Reduces all damage taken by 20% and deals energy damage to attackers. This effect cannot occur more than once every second. Lasts 10 seconds. Cloak of Pain refreshes to its full duration when attacked, but this effect cannot last more than 30 seconds in total.
Cloak of Pain can also be buffed by a variety of utilities:
Cloak of Carnage (Skillful utility) – Increases the damage dealt by Cloak of Pain by 15% and increases its duration by 4 seconds.
Cloak of Rage (Skillful utility) – While Cloak of Pain is active, it generates 1 Rage whenever you are attacked. This effect cannot occur more than once every 2 seconds.
Subjugation (Masterful utility) - Cloak of Pain can be used while stunned.
Cloak of Annihilation (Masterful utility) - Each use of Assault, Battering Assault, and Crippling Slash reduces the active cooldown of Cloak of Pain by 3 seconds.
Cloak of Pain is a great defensive ability that also contributes damage if used optimally. Reducing damage taken by 20% is not enough to mitigate massive damage at high health but is amazing for sustained high damage phases (e.g., burn phase in Dread Council, etc.). I usually take Cloak of Carnage and Cloak of Rage for operations. Subjugation is situationally useful for fights with stun mechanics (e.g., Dismantler swipe in Draxus encounter). I do not recommend Cloak of Annihilation as its abilities are not used frequently enough to be that beneficial.
Saber Ward (3 minute cooldown) - Raises a lightsaber ward, increasing melee and ranged defenses by 50% and absorbing 25% of the damage taken from Force and Tech attacks. Lasts 12 seconds.
Saber Ward can be buffed by the Blood Ward Heroic utility. If taking the utility, activating Saber Ward grants immunity to stun, sleep, lift, and incapacitating effects for 6 seconds, and getting attacked while Saber Ward is active heals you for 3% of your maximum health. This healing effect cannot occur more than once every second.
Saber Ward is the Marauder's long duration / long cooldown big defensive ability. Marauders have a base defense chance of 5% assuming no gearing for Defense, so with Saber Ward active the defense chance is buffed to 55%. That level of defense chance is nice but is risky for mitigating high damage attacks if you fail to dodge. Fortunately, weapon attack mechanics tend to consist of multiple attacks so the defense buff is still helpful. The 25% reduction to Force/Tech damage taken is far more reliable to help mitigate damage mechanics in my opinion.
I rarely take the Blood Ward utility. The immunity to various effects could be situationally helpful for a few specific mechanics but the heal is unlikely to be useful outside of PvP.
Force Camouflage (45 second cooldown) - Obscures yourself with the Force, becoming difficult to detect, reducing your threat towards all enemies, reducing all damage taken by 50%, granting immunity to controlling effects, and increasing movement speed by 30%. Lasts 4 seconds. Dealing direct damage ends the effect prematurely.
Expunging Camouflage (Masterful utility) - Force Camouflage removes all cleansable effects when activated.
Phantom (Masterful utility) - Increases your movement speed by 15% and the movement speed bonus of Force Camouflage by 20%. Additionally, increases the duration of Force Camouflage by 2 seconds.
Hidden Savagery (Heroic utility) - While Force Camouflage is active, you gain a charge of Hidden Savagery every 0.5 seconds. Each charge of Hidden Savagery increases the damage dealt by your next melee attack by 4%. Stacks up to 12 charges and lasts for up to 6 seconds after exiting Force Camouflage.
Force Camouflage is a really great defensive ability but requires skill to use effectively. The threat drop effect is the only way for Marauders to drop aggro, which is nice. The self cleanse (with utility) is extremely useful for fights that require cleanses, especially if your team’s composition involves Powertechs or Snipers that cannot self cleanse.
The 50% reduction in damage taken for 4 seconds (6 with utility) is amazingly strong if used properly. The key to its use is timing Force Camouflage immediately prior to a predictable high damage mechanic and waiting to activate any attack abilities until after the damage goes out and is successfully mitigated.
I frequently take Expunging Camouflage for any fights where a self cleanse is useful. I may take Phantom for fights with predictable high damage mechanics to give me a little more margin for error when using it to mitigate damage.
Hidden Savagery is extremely situational and rarely useful as it changes Force Camouflage from a strong defensive ability and self-cleanse to a very specific offensive cooldown for downtime. The key to using Hidden Savagery is activating Force Camouflage during downtime or transition phases where you have 6 seconds of downtime. This lets you build 12 charges and buffs your first ability when re-engaging the boss by 48%. This is also frequently used in parsing to add more damage in the opener. I do not recommend Hidden Savagery as few fights have enough downtime to be useful and Force Camouflage is more useful as a self cleanse and defensive ability in my opinion.
Undying Rage (2:30 minute cooldown) - Reduces the damage you take by 99% for 6 seconds.
Undying Rage can be buffed by the Undying Masterful utility. The utility increases the duration of Undying Rage by 2 seconds and reduces its cooldown by 30 seconds.
Undying Rage is a great ability to mitigate one hit kill mechanics. Unlike cheese abilities like Force Shroud or Saber Reflect (or Blade Blitz…), there are some abilities that Undying Rage will not mitigate since they deal so much damage that even taking 1% will still kill you. However, the majority of one hit kill mechanics can be mitigated with Undying Rage. It can also be really useful if a tank dies and you get aggro, since Undying Rage will give you just enough time taking no damage for a healer to get a battle rez out and a couple heals on the tank so they can grab the boss back.
I do not usually take Undying but may take it if I think there is a decent chance I could end up with aggro on a boss due to a tank death or pulling aggro. Absent that situation, I feel that the extra duration is not helpful since most big hitting mechanics last less than 4 seconds, and the cooldown reduction is not that helpful on most fights either.
Mad Dash (45 second cooldown) - Madly dash forward 20 meters, dealing weapon damage to enemies in your path and increasing your defense chance by 100% while blitzing. Cannot be used while immobilized or hindered.
Mad Dash can be buffed by the Through Victory Heroic utility. With the utility, Mad Dash can be used while immobilized, purges movement-impairing effects when activated, and deals 50% more damage. Additionally, the cooldown of Mad Dash is reduced by 10 seconds.
Mad Dash is a great mobility and defensive ability. It can be used to move around the map together with Force Charge and Predation, but it really shines as a defensive ability. Most damage mechanics can be mitigated through good timing of Mad Dash. However, timing it correctly can take some practice so be careful with it until you get comfortable with the timing for a given mechanic.
Obfuscate (1 minute cooldown, 4m range) - Obscures the target's vision, reducing its melee and ranged accuracy by 90% for 6 seconds. Cannot be used on Operation bosses. This ability does not respect the global cooldown.
Pacify can be buffed by various utilities:
Ruthless Aggressor (Heroic utility) - Vicious Throw refunds 2 Rage when used on a target affected by your Obfuscate and can be used on any target affected by your Obfuscate, regardless of remaining health. Additionally, activating Obfuscate grants Ruthless Aggressor, reducing the damage you take from Force and Tech attacks by 75% for 6 seconds.
Subjugation (Masterful utility) - Reduces the cooldown of Obfuscate by 15 seconds and increases its range by 6 meters. In addition, the cooldown of Disruption is reduced by 2 seconds, and Cloak of Pain can be used while stunned.
Obfuscate is a neat defensive cooldown that is primarily PvP oriented but with the Ruthless Aggressor utility it becomes a really powerful defensive cooldown. The big downside to this option is that operations bosses cannot be targeted by Obfuscate to activate the damage resistance. However, it could be useful on fights with adds that can be targeted by Obfuscate.
The Marauder can also take a variety of other utilities that help improve overall survivability:
Brazen (Skillful utility) - Increases your damage reduction by 2%
Defensive Roll (Skillful utility) - Reduces damage taken from area effects by 30% and increases internal and elemental damage reduction by 3%.
I usually take both Brazen and Defensive Roll. Extra damage resistance is always helpful and internal/elemental damage resistance is particularly valuable since it is very uncommon.