SWTOR PVE Tier List Patch 7.7 (Best Classes in 2025)

A Tier List for Star Wars: The Old Republic Patch 7.7. In this one, I am rating all classes in the game from best to worst for Operations, Flashpoints and Solo play.

About the list

Hi guys, Ivano here with an update to the PVE tier list. Since there were some balance changes in patch 7.7, I thought I'd go over these again and rank them from good to not so good.

As always, two things to keep in mind. First of all, this is only my opinion. At the end of the day, play what you find fun. For PVE, unless you want to do the hardest master mode operations, all of these are perfectly fine and playable, especially with the gear that we have now.

And then the most common question that I always get on these is where are the Republic or Light Side classes? They are not included because I don't want to do everything twice. And this game of course has Mirror classes. If you don't know what that is, check out this video first.

S-Tier

But now without further ado, first class on the list is Darkness, Assassin Tank. Nothing changed there. I think it's still the strongest tank overall in PVE. Very solid damage and then Shroud plus also the Shroud after Vanish let you ignore a lot of mechanics. So if you want to play Tank, Darkness I think is still the best one to play.

Pyro PT also didn't see any changes. After the nerf to the superheated fuel tactical in one of the last patches, you now simply play Flame Dissipation. But Pyro is still the most played and overall most effective spec when it comes to DPS in PVE. So for sure it will also stay in S tier.

Annihilation provides a lot of off-healing, so if your healers are struggling in an operation, you always want to have an Anni Marauder. Of course they also have the two raid buffs which are very useful.

Whenever you need some adds to be killed quickly, Vengeance with the Cut to Pieces tactical has the best AOE in the game.

These three are the DPS specs that you want to look into if you want to have the best of the best. I think both Anni and Vengeance are definitely one step below Pyro, but overall I would still put them in S tier because they're very, very solid specs.

Next, we have Medicine Operative, which got buffed this patch. A lot of people were saying anyway Medicine is the best healer with the highest healing output and also the best off DPS. In my opinion, that depends a little bit on your skill level as well. If you're a very good player for sure, you can put Medicine even above Bodyguard as the best healer, can tend to be a little squishy because Bodyguard simply has better defensive cooldowns. But since Medicine got buffed this patch, I will upgrade it to S tier.

Then we have Bodyguard, which was the only healing discipline in this game that didn't see any changes in Patch 7.7, and so unsurprisingly I will leave it in S tier. I think it is still very good, relatively easy to play. The only thing you need to learn is watching your positioning, because you're not the most mobile class, and then heat management is a thing, but otherwise very strong heals, single target and also AOE, good defensive cooldowns, so everything you want from a healer.

If we're looking at what some of the best healers in the game are running for some of the hardest bosses, you can see they pair Bodyguard and Corruption, some of them play Bodyguard and Medicine. The HPS is relatively comparable, but that also depends on the group composition. So really, if you're good enough, I think all the healers are playable. Corruption may be a little bit less great this patch because they nerfed the force management, but I think it could be a toss-up between Bodyguard and Medicine for the top spot.

A-Tier

Shield Tech I will leave it in A tier, definitely one step below Darkness, but it is very easy to play, so I think if you're still getting into tanking, maybe you want to learn the boss mechanics, with Shield Tech your rotation is really very simple, so you can focus on learning when to pop your defensive cooldowns. And in most operations where you want two tanks, it It's really good to pair with a Darkness Assassin, so I will leave Shieldtech in A.

Virulence and Engineering, I will leave in A tier as well. In my opinion, they are still clearly the best ranged DPS. Snipers, of course, have a lot of group utility, can run Ballistic Shield, very strong, and both of them can do insane damage numbers. There was a reason why Marksman was buffed this patch, is because simply it was lacking a little bit compared to Virulence and Engi. So if you want to play ranged DPS in a raid, the best ones still in this patch, in my opinion, are Virulence and Engi Sniper.

Hatred, still the highest passing single target spec in the game. If you look at Parsley with the new augments, you will see it's pretty much all Hatred or Serenity, the mirror class, then there's one Concealment Operative at 36k, but at least on the dummy, there's really nothing that can beat Hatred. So it's very great for boss DPS. It's also strong for AoE, but overall I would still put it one step below these three S-Tier DPS classes, because it can be a little squishy, and then overall in terms of raid utility, the classes up here just have a little bit more to offer. But Hatred for sure very strong, if you need to do boss DPS and you want to top the meters, Hatred is probably a good pick.

Lethality, for me, is always in a similar spot to Hatred, very good DPS, also of course a melee-based DoT class, also has very good AoE, however, Leth is a little bit tankier. The group utility is okay, the raid buff it brings is not really the best, and for sure it's not as useful as a ballistic shield or even the rebounders from Pyro if you know what you're doing, but Lethality overall is very strong, the damage is very solid, and this is why it stays in A tier.

B-Tier

Now we're moving on to some specs in B tier, of course most of these were not changed. Immortal is still is the worst out of the three tanking disciplines in the game, does good damage, but it can be squishy in PvE, and overall the other tanks just do a little bit better, and this is why Immortal of course is fine to play, but I will leave it in B tier.

Corruption Sorcerer was changed this patch. They nerfed the force cost of most of the abilities. I think Dark Infusion was the only one that actually slightly got buffed, so the force cost was lowered. So in a nutshell, you will simply run out of force faster, which lowers the healing output a little bit, and it means while Corruption is still relatively easy to learn and fun to play, I think this patch I will move it one step down to B tier.

AP PT, now when it comes to PvE, AP PT is now one of the worst parsing specs in the game and more than 5k DPS behind Hatred for example. So when it comes to sustained damage, it is not that great, but to be honest neither is Pyro. Of course what makes PTs strong in PvE is that they can do a lot of passive damage or leech damage when they get hit into Pyro shield, or from reflective armor when they take AoE, you basically get like 1-2k free DPS, which means that they are much better in a raid than they are on the dummy. But nevertheless on the dummy in isolation they are not that good, so they probably still might need some sustained damage buff. However, they have very good group utility, and of course the burst is also great if you need it, so that's why I will leave them in B tier.

Rage, nothing changed there, it's a very solid spec, the damage is really good, it's actually one of the higher parsing specs in the game, the AoE is good but not as crazy as Vengeance, and this is why I will leave it in B tier.

So now we get to Innovative Ordnance, which of course was buffed in Patch 7.7. If we just look at the parses and we see before the patch you know the best that anyone was doing was like 34k, and now after the patch dropped here all these are from June, there's already a lot of guys surpassing that with the best one at 35k, so it was a small buff, nothing too crazy. And DPS wise it means that IO is now pretty much on par with Viru and Engi, at least when it comes to single target, but I guess utility wise I would rather have a sniper, so maybe we move IO up to the top of B tier, but probably still one step below these A tier specs here.

Next, we have Madness, of course, Madness got a nerf to its heal on force leech, which will be a small nerf, damage will still be fine. To be honest, I think nothing really changes for Madness; it's still a very solid spec in PVE.

Then Carnage, of course, had this one crazy patch where it moved really super fast. That was just a bug with Swiftness which they fixed; otherwise, there were no balance changes to Carnage. It's still a very solid spec, can do good damage, but it doesn't have the raid heal that Annihilation has. It is, however, better than Fury, so I will leave it in B tier.

Lightning, another spec that was buffed, so I guess kudos to Broadsword, they are buffing the specs that are slightly underperforming. For Lightning, again looking at the parses, and you can see before the patch, again the best parse was 34k, which is decent, but of course, Lightning is very dependent on RNG procs. Now the best parse we have, only a few weeks after the patch dropped, is already a solid 1k DPS higher, and with 35k this is very competitive, and so in my opinion, that warrants an upgrade for Lightning into B tier as well.

C-Tier

So, moving on to C tier, Marksman saw a little buff, and if we look at parses, you can see that a lot of people have already tried out. So all of these are after the buff, all of these are new 34k, which means it's still a little bit behind Engineering, for example, but overall that might be enough to warrant an upgrade from Marksman into B tier.

Next, we have Arsenal, similar, it got straight up damage buffs. I think this is now the fourth or fifth round of buffs in the 7.0 expansion for Arsenal, but if we look at the DPS, like even after those buffs here, the parsers are not really that crazy, but still no one has broken 33k. So unfortunately, the damage buffs are still not good enough, and while Arsenal is of course relatively easy to play and it is quite tanky, there are better specs when it comes to killing bosses and also adds, so Arsenal stays in C tier.

Deception got a couple of buffs, and from looking at the top parses, it seems like it was a small but decent buff. Deception, of course, when you compare it to Hatred, which again is the highest parsing spec single target spec in the game, and also has better AoE, is roughly still 10% behind. This is why, for me, Deception is maybe now a C tier spec, but probably not better than that.

Concealment for me is in a similar spot. They didn't get any changes in this patch, they are of course playable single target wise, they parse quite highly (current top parse 36k), but Lethality is even better and being a dot class, can keep up more of its damage during movement phases. So Concealment has a similar issue like Advanced Prototype: why would you play AP if Pyro exists and just does everything better? Similarly, Lethality is so well rounded and just a good overall spec, that there are few reasons (outside of personal enjoyment) to play Concealment. However, I still think that because of the buff that Concealment got in 7.6, I think it was, just because the damage is simply 10% higher than Fury, maybe I will put Concealment in C tier.

D-Tier

And finally, that brings us to D tier, where we have Fury Marauder. Fury I think got one too many nerfs this expansion, because of a little trick that people were doing with dummy parsing. But since they lost the auto crit on Berserk, the damage is just not good enough. Quick check even on the dummy, looking at Fury, no one is even breaking 34k, and it's of course a melee spec, so in a real raid your uptime will not be as good, and this is why I will leave it in D tier.

So that's all for today guys, let me know what you think about this updated tier list, and again keep in mind play whatever you enjoy, because how well you play a spec is way more important than what spec you play. So don't forget the most important thing, it's a video game, have fun.