Such a ridiculous amount of fail.

So a guildmate and I decided to go through the Alderaan bonus quest series this evening (Republic side), and after knocking out the "soloable" storyline chain we decided to run through the various Heroics that opened up along the way. This was done as a group of three, a 40 sentinel (my guildmate), 41 guardian(a pug) and a 44 sage (myself). We picked up two other [Heroic 2] quests that took place in the same area (Survivors and Turning the Tide) and had no issue with them before deeper in to the area for the last one. Into the Killik Warrens also has a 4 stage bonus quest attached to it, with the first two stages taking place outside the cave alongside the other two quests objectives. The cave I refer to is a large 3 winged cave (that also contains one of the Datacrons for Alderaan) inside each of the wings is one of the objectives for the 3rd stage of the bonus quest, with a small sub-wing attached to the longest tunnel that branches out holds the final objective. Clearing each wing took roughly 15-20 minutes each, as there were pulls every 30-40 meters, and their respawn seemed to be right around 10 minutes, which meant having to fight of respawns half way back out that wing. This was probably the worst heroic quest we have encountered so far (my guildmate and I both have level 50s on Empire side, so we have seen a majority of the games quests) simply for the amount of time invested for the reward. It took almost 2 hours from the time we started to the time we finally quick traveled out of the cave only to find the rewards to be a randomized blue item lockbox that contained a variety of disappointing and useless items. A sniper rifle with aim and shield rating on it, and a level 230 diplomacy mission among the quickly vendored list. I realize that Republic side clearly got less "testing" in beta simply because of the population imbalance among testers likely mirrored how it is on live, but this is just not an enjoyable or even worthwhile quest series. Not sure what if anything could even be done to make these actually worth doing in the future with any character I might level, but for now I'll be sure to avoid them like the plague.

Actually, I can't heal repeatedly for ages, because of the energy mechanic if I use my base heal (Kolto Injection) in rapid succession I end up energy starved and because of diminished rate at which energy regenerates at lower percentages, I become effectively useless save a 2 minute cooldown which restores 50 (or 66 with skill points) energy. All of my other "direct" healing tools consume our secondary mechanic TA stacks. This is a class balance issue between healers, which I said I wasn't going to get in to, but since everyone has brought it up I'm throwing it out there. I'm not saying the other healing lines don't have their share of issues - but to say that I have a bunch of criteria required for a DPS ability, and there are no criteria for healing is just dumb.

How often do you see someone turn around to prevent being backstabbed outside of a 1v1 situation? Not often. I'd wager either your gearing choices or skill points are in the wrong place if you can't break 4k with a Maul crit on a non-50 target, either that or you are sub level 20 and don't even have Induction for the bonus 30% crit damage on Maul.

Heals can contribute, I'm not disputing that. The problem is how much they can contribute when played properly is laughable when compared to damage dealers. In an 8v8 Warzone, you're lucky to find one healer on each team, and the difference between a good healer and a bad healer can be quickly apparent. However, a team with 6 damage dealers and 2 healers can easily lose to an opposing team with 8 damage dealers. Why? Because damage far outweighs healing right now.

Backstab as Concealment for 4k, or Heal for 4k as Medicine. If you try healing as any spec but Medicine, good luck to you, Kolto Injection is a 2.5 second cast for 1500 healing. Backstab was probably a poor example, so I'll use Maul for Assassins instead. My assassin alt (currently level 40) frequently crits with Maul for 4000+ on targets that are not level 50 or have very little expertise (using this for the equally geared point, since my Assassin has no expertise), and it is applied instantly, cannot be interrupted, and skill tree and proc permitting can be used 2-4 times in a row.

So they've more or less made it so that DPS can worry about one less thing, while healers are more likely to be effective by being out of combat health batteries for those too dumb to use their "Rest" abilities when they are out of combat. Again, this goes back to discouraging healing roles instead of actually addressing the issue. If a healer in hard mode PvE gear can crit heal for 7k, great, he's going to drop a lot faster than a PvP geared healer to make up for it.

Except it's not balanced. One crit attack from any equally geared damage dealer is more damage dealt than a crit heal because of this debuff. I can backstab someone for 4000, or heal an ally for 2800. Which one is more effective in 90% of situations?

What is the thought process behind the Trauma debuff being in the game? I really don't see any logic behind it other than to further encourage players to run DPS specs in PvP than the current game already does. A 30% healing debuff to anyone engaged in, or recently engaged in PvP combat reduces healing to an effort in futility against even one semi-competent opponent. Interrupts are in the game for a reason, even if only 10% of the playerbase uses them intelligently. I've been a healer in almost every MMO I've played for the last 10+ years (starting with DAoC when it first launched) and I've yet to see anything as carelessly designed as Trauma in it's current form. Healers have and probably always will be a thankless job, both in PvE and PvP. For most people it's just not an enjoyable role to play, and I can understand that, in this game however, it's quickly becoming very difficult to enjoy. I'm not going to get in to imbalances between the three healing skill trees, because that is another issue that needs to be addressed separately. I will say however, that I play an Operative with currently just under 450 expertise (9.35%) and seeing my biggest heal crit (with trinkets) for less than one attack from an equally geared opponent is a complete joke, when you consider the energy mechanic I am limited by, casting times, interrupts and ratio of damage dealing players versus healers. Before the trolls arrive and tell me to switch to concealment and enjoy the faceroll - I've already done that, I had my fun with fun with it. I'm not expecting a dev response, despite the recent "blog" post about upcoming PvP changes, I have yet to see a dev post on this forum since launch. I am hoping someone out there can explain "what they were smoking" when they decided to implement this Trauma system.

Would be happy if they'd just fix the party/op frames so that they work properly. So frustrating as a healer to have some people's bars updating and others not. Resolve also needs a good look at, because right now it's a joke.