[Tanking Readiness]

You sound geared properly, assuming your splits are def/shield/abs (actually if at all possible, you may want to drop some of the shield into absorbtion).

 

Just a few suggestions on technique:

1. When fighting the trash mobs in HM's don't try to have every mob focused on you at all times, let some of the dps take the aggro off of you for normal enemies. They don't hit hard enough to seriously damage a DPS member, but 4 of them focused on you + a couple of strongs or an elite will drain you fast.

2. For boss fights on HM the enrage timers are more important than anything. It could be the DPS that are bringing you down.

3. For the two bosses you mentioned - Bonus HM BT: kite him around a box and just hold his aggro while DPS go at him, you will have to pop out every now and then to hit him with something; Bridge Boss on False Emperor: he does a whirly move that hits hard, get out of the way of that or it doesn't matter how good your healer is. Also, in False Emperor there are a lot trash mob "drop-ins" that happen close to ledges, use your knockbacks to blow them off the ledge.

4. Know what your groupmates can and cannot CC.

5. Probably most importantly in fighting trash or multiple NPC boss fights is to set a priority of kill. This should start at medic, then go to easiest to kill to hardest to kill. All the while make sure the hardest to kill is focused on you. The reason to take out the medic first is obvious, but your group should always kill the weakest first and then kill the hardest mob due to you taking less damage in the quickest fashion.

 

Other than those things know the rotation. There is a good guide here and also on sithwarrior.com.

 

Another thing is if your guild isn't playing very often then you may want to get you and your friends into another guild. Undergeared Assassins are good off-tanks (you'll be dpsing most of the time unless the main tank gets defeated) in the 8 man raids, and that is the quickest way to get a couple of pieces of columi gear.

 

edit: one of the most overlooked things in this game is that since you only get two dps slots in which to party with, a subpar dps member can really kill your chances at killing a boss since they are all on enrage timers.

[SW:TOR - First Expansion opinions]

In my opinion the only way the story can develop in expansions is through fighting over resources so it will be more controlling planets since the all-out war the game constantly alludes to can never be realized since it will not fit into canon for an Empire story (where you as the Empire player "win" the war) since we all know how the story plays out and the Republic is saved.

 

I hope it doesn't focus on space combat since that is more of a mini-game anyways and is in no way MMO style play.

[Assassin Tank End Game Gear Problem]

So the other day I did a raid with my guild and got 2 token for chest and boot pieces of Columni gear. So I went to trade the piece tokens for the actual gear and noticed that the gear has an enhancement mod that gives bonuses to Absorption (good, usable for a tank) and accuracy (***?!?!?). So in comparison I stroll over to the Jugg Columni gear vendor and see that it gives bonuses to Defense and Shield.

 

So my question is why doesn't Assassin tank end game gear give something like Defense instead of Accuracy? Is it because the set-piece bonus gives a +5% to shield (2 piece bonus) while Dark Ward is active?

[High rest textures to go on sale as microtransaction?]

I am gonna start flagging and reporting every made up thread like this.

 

Me too, if you look at OP's post history he has been saying he has unsubbed for about 2 weeks and actively trying to get others to unsub too. He is a troll. Oh, and yeah it was his thread he started where he read that.

[Dual Spec...when?]

Let's get ability delay fixed for pvp before we start asking for dual spec. What's the point in switching from healing to dps when my abilities don't fire in time-sensitive situations?

 

They have more than one team of programmers. Since when could companies only do one thing at one time?

[Dual Spec...when?]

From my point of view, adding dual spec removes many of the rewards gained by work and sacrifice. The effort and investment to attain those edges of optimization go unrewarded if you can get it comparably speaking for free. It gives motivation that drives player through the content as well as adding value to the sense of accomplishment.

 

Dual specs are a short cut to what otherwise is attained by effort, the multiple specialist. By adding in dual specs, you cut the needed effort to be good in multiple arenas into fractions of what it is. Especially, in a game where people are complaining about there being a lack of endgame, why take away the motivation to participate in what the game does do well just to excel at at what it is currently doing sort of badly by the accounts of many.

 

*

 

Honestly, taking this from the player perspective is sort of missing the point of the how the game was developed. SWTOR excels at developing a richly-storied character in many different flavors. Each character is intended to be that well-developed and represent it's path to it present, not just be a placeholder for time spent by the player in the game. If you just want credit for your time in and be able to convert your levels to build for your avatar/gaming platform for your specific current activity, you are headed off the intended path and asking to do it in a way the devalues the direction of those playing as intended.

 

Yes, that is different than some players have grown accustomed but, it's also why SWTOR is seeing alot of players that weren't playing MMOs recently. Many were waiting for a game like this about story and not about being an eSport.

 

The lack of endgame content has nothing to do with dual speccing and has everything to do with this being a new MMO and the content not being developed yet. Dual speccing actually allows people to experience endgame content more freely, becuase they won't always have to wait on a certain role to fill the group or turn down other players because that role in the group is filled.

 

And yes, the story is what is bringing some people into the game. But you are flat out lying to yourself if you think packing 8 stories into a game is what Bioware was trying to deliver or that is the reason most people bought this game. If I wanted 8 story lines I would just go buy 4 Bioware games since all of them come with 2 story lines a piece (good or evil). The story is what is going to make leveling an alt worth it to me. Because the only reason I am going to level an alt is for the profession, the story is just a bonus so it won't be as monotonous.

[Dual Spec...when?]

Note that my "draconian" view of RPGs cames from Dragon Age. Bioware only added respecs in an expansion after mass whining on the forums, and the result was broken characters. If you used the respec, you could create characters that were drastically more powerful than anything you could have or would have created without it.

 

First of all, this isn't a discussion about respeccing. This is a discussion about dual spec.

 

If this quote is really what you are basing all of your arguments on then you need to quit. Dragon Age is a single player RPG. This is an MMORPG. Very different in the ways the game is structured. MMO's have PVP and PVE where Single Players just have PVE. This is one reason for dual spec.

 

Single Player RPG's also don't have multiplayer groups. You take your companions and you roll with them. Not true in MMO's where players fill the role of tank, dps and healer. And really the concept of companions fulfilling the off-roles of tank, dps and healer are fairly new for Single Player RPG's (such as DA and basically all of Bioware's console games). Granted, most had mechanics that used this thinking (two lines of characters where chars up front would take physical damage), but they weren't fully fleshed roles as they are now. Dual spec in an MMO allows a player to fulfill two group obligations for his guild in different circumstances. In an Op where the group may not need that player to tank he can switch to a DPS build. In a Flashpoint where the group may need a tank, the player can switch to a tank build. I'm not advocating being able to swith AC's as the AC is really your class.

 

And I also think you are misunderstanding what the Role in Role-Playing Game video games has historically meant. It typically has meant fantasy. Where you are a character in a story where most of your progression is rigidly determined from your stats to your abilities (think NES through Playstation RPG's, notably all Square and Enix RPG's, who were the big boys back in the day). Even Zelda, which is an action-RPG, is very rigid. But Zelda is an RPG because you are playing the role of Link. RPG's fall into many sub-genres including MMOs. MMO mechanics are different than Single Player mechanics, so you can't really base your argument on the fact that BW introduced respeccing into DA as a reason that dual speccing will hurt this game.

 

tl;dr - There are many types of RPG's and basing what you think should be in an MMO off of a Single Player game is doing a disservice to you and your argument.

[Electrostaff and you!]

Is there any chance we could see some love for the electrostaff? I mean, why would I ever use one? I think they are cool looking, but they are completely useless since half our abilities don't work with them.

 

What do you think? Should Electrostaffs be on par with double-lightsabres?

 

You want a Jedi without a lightsaber? Seriously?....Seriously?

[Current state of Ilum...]

Wait, they rolled some people back? I thought the HeroEngine couldn't handle rollbacks. Isn't that why they never announced rollbacks: they couldn't do them?

 

They did several roll-backs in Beta.

[Tanks -- What companion do you use?]

Talos definitely makes killing things faster for me with a tank spec, means I never even have to seethe between fights.

 

^This, plus I would add to that, that I am less likely to die in a fight, especially in a fight with a gold elite with trash mobs. Plus Talos has a stun that will interupt some abilities that I've found useful.

[Can you outlevel harvesting nodes on a given planet?]

If the skill that it takes to harvest the node under the name of the node is gray then yes you have outleveled it. If it is green then most of the time you get one point. If yellow, two points. Same as your gathering missions that you send companions on.

[Please fix bug on artifice]

Hi

 

I hope there are someone that will read this and finally do something about it.

 

I'm not the typical complainer, but this is an issue that has bugged me since the beta..

 

I have noticed, at the artifice skilltrainer, if u choose the "show all skills"- option, instead of the "show trainable", you should as an artificer, be able to make mods, from skill lvl 240 and up. Only problem is, when you try to learn these mods, a red pop-up shows on you're screen, telling you that: "You don't have the right crewskill".

 

Then why is the option there?

 

I think, i'm among the few, that has realized, that the artifice skilltrainer, offers you this option to learn to make mods among the other skills; Hilts, crystals and such.

 

My concern is, that it is an option, that has been forgotten under the development of the game, and because ppl learning this crafting skill, doesnt always think to use the "Show ALL skills" instead of the "Show Trainable only"-option, they don't see it.

 

So my question is, is this going to be something artificers will be able to learn or is it a mistake, and should the option be removed all together?

 

I've made 5 tickets concerning this issue, and only 2 of the tickets have been replied on. One of the times with a guide on how to recover destroyed items. And that isnt even the issue here.

 

I know, you receive several thousand of tickets concerning bugs and what nots, but please bioware. Read this and make time to take a look and make a fix. Its only a matter of time before others will notice, and then you'll have to make time anyway.

 

I hope this is a thing that will be looked apon, and not just be pushed back in line..

 

Pretty sure it is a mistake to be even be showing you those items. I've noticed it too, but have read where they took mod crafting away from Artificers in beta and gave all mod crafting to cybertech maybe? Anyway, those learnable schematics aren't supposed to show up period for Artificers.

[Why people complaining?]

It's kinda pointless to level any crafting profession except biochem and possibly cybertech. If this was BW plan, then should have just avoid put in those crafting professions. I mean adding one or two pieces of raid level gear per spec, tank, dps, healer, wouldn't hurt pve or pvp. In fact, most people would buy them and discard them once he/she gets their full pve or pvp set for the looks and bonuses at least. Problem is how do you make the mats for those raid quality gear difficult to acquire?

 

I don't think you get the mats any harder to get, you make the REing harder to proc to be able to craft uber mods/gear. Make the raid bosses drop the schematics.

[Crewskills mobile app ?]

Based on the computer requirements for this game to be playable, I would believe the exact opposite to be true. It's like driving a Maserati to go clothes shopping at Walmart.

 

At first glance I would tend to agree with you. Smart phones are currently around 30% of the mobile phone market and a huge chunk of that includes basically two groups - techies and people that have them for work. Not sure what the dynamic is there, but I would assume most (50-60%ish) people have them for work. Now part of that group would also fall under the techie title too. Gamers for the most part are considered techies, especially gamers that play on PC's. If I had to throw a percentage out there of MMO players that had smartphones I would probably land between 60-70% and think that is a conservative guess.

 

One thing that really influences my guess is that WoW had a subscription based app that they wouldn't have produced if they didn't think they would make money with. So surely they had to assume that enough people would use it and subscribe to it to make it worth their while to create it. My 2 cents though.

[Why people complaining?]

My solution is similar to what a lot of people are saying:

 

Have raid bosses drop gear that they do now and also drop craftable green items. When the craftable recipes are RE'd all the way to max then they should be slightly better than the raid gear that is dropped. Make it so that crafters have to do a lot of legwork to get craftable items that are better than the equipment raid drops. Right now the system is crafters do a lot of leg work and their gear still isn't up to par.

 

This solution makes the hardcore crafters still have to participate in end game content, but gives them a reward that they can turn around and market to the player base that the players can't get anywhere else if they want to be maxed out. And I'm not just talking about dropping mod item recipes. Drop recipes for the professions that make armor and weapons too that will be equal mod items once those are maxed RE'd also. That way everybody can hang on to their orange items and mod them out or they can purchase a crafted piece of armor or weapon that won't hinder their effectiveness.

[Crewskills mobile app ?]

It's a nice idea, but I bet most people who play this game don't have an iPhone or an Android so it would put them at a serious disadvantage.

 

So lets hold people that do have those devices back because everybody else doesn't have it? No Child Left Behind!

[Crewskills mobile app ?]

I doubt they are really all that usefull. I have a sneaky suspision that they are popular because the marketing people say you need one and not because they are really all that usefull. But that is an other discussion.

 

But try and convince me that a smartphone would be usefull. To be honest I would like one. No apple ofcourse but a Samsung or HTC. But the price is stopping me. My heart says buy one, everyone has one and so you need one as well. But my mind says why would I need one. I never have used by phone for anything but for calling and texting people. I have never ever even used the camera that is on my phone.

 

The experience of getting your first smartphone is comparable to the first mobile phone you got. Before you have one, you think, "I don't need that." Before everybody had a mobile, they said, "well I have my landline that can do everything a mobile can do so why do I need that?" Then they got a mobile and the freedom to be able to call anybody from almost anywhere was a luxury that people really liked. Kind of like now with a smartphone, people say, "well everything I can do on a smartphone can be covered by either my cell phone (calls, texts) or my computer (email, games, etc.). A smartphone is another type of those luxuries that once you experience the freedom of the mobility it gives you (not always having to be around your computer to have access to email, game apps, other useful apps for facebook, twitter, etc.), you will start to question how you got along without it. That is my best attempt at convincing you - that you basically just don't understand what you are missing, just like before you got your first mobile phone you didn't realize what you were missing then either. So, if you get one be prepared to never turn back, just like you can never give up your mobile phone now. There is a reason that Blackberry's, the first widely used smartphone, was nicknamed "Crackberry". Just don't get a Blackberry, they are going out of business soon unless they change their corporate structure quickly.

[Why people complaining?]

How about making the high end content drop items that need crafters to turn it into something of use? Then crafting and high end content are both needed. It's win-win.

 

What usually ends up happening, and I suspect it's happening in SW TOR is that high end content drops better than craftable gear making crafing essentially useless... or it becomes an expensive buff like WoW crafting, which brought crafting to a new low...

 

Why can't we have a simple economy like SWG or Eve where crafting is needed and actually not a waste of time??

 

I just wish for once a dev would be ethical and admit they designed crafting to be a time consuming money sink that has no real effect on endgame and be done with it...

 

Note: I could be wrong about the above. My highest toon is only level 30. If I am wrong that I will be happy.

 

Nope, you're right.

[Why people complaining?]

I don't think anyone actually expects to be able to craft gear equal to raid drops, if they are thats silly.

 

My gripe is that BioChem is leaps and bounds infront of the others at end game for what it offers the players.

 

I just think it would be nice if each profession offered the player something unique for them, much like in WoW, extra gem slots etc.

 

Aside from that, I like the system think it's great. <3

 

People were told that craftable gear would be "on par" with raid gear; which would allow people to be unique in their look. It isn't. It isn't even close. Why shouldn't somebody that is willing to do 1,000 RE's on their final craftable items not get something equal to raid gear? You don't think doing that many RE's is as time consuming and expensive as raiding?

[GTN poorely developed]

really. this will be offtopic, and i have long ceased to re-educate people who have been extremely conditioned with the 'anyone can make it' illusion, but, i will make an exception here and reply. i feel some kind of responsibility towards this swtor community, for some reason.

 

............

 

how many bill gates are there ? 100 ? 200 ? or, the people who qualify in the same situation are just in the range of 30 to 40 or something, u.s. wide ?

 

the rest ? do you know how many people have tried and didnt make it with startups even in the 90s ? ill tell you - there are hundreds of thousands.

 

and, these were lucky people - they were born with the inclinations that were in demand in their time - information technology. and were lucky to be able to get an education for that end, having the family circumstances and funds to be able to do so. and they were right at the time a NEW field/market that was not totally cornered/controlled by established megacorps was coming into being - the internet.

 

for the majority 85% of population, these are just dreams. most have to work in two jobs just to sustain their family right from the start. no college, no other thing.

 

and no - a 0.5% from among these striking luck and being able to rise from the ashes does NOT make it a rule or norm.

 

and, as in all cases of 'wild west frontier' situations, after the first phases of freedom in such new frontiers, hierarchical megacompanies enter the market and reestablish hierarchy there - either through acquisitions/purchases, or through setting up their own strong arm through new subsidiaries they founded - exactly how it happened in the last 5 years on the internet.

 

.............

but the story of a handful who 'made it' gets continually perpetuated by the media/system as an example.

 

let me tell you one thing :

 

if, these were common occurrences, there would be no news value or story value to them so that people would show these people as examples.

 

so, please spare us the ayn rand crap.

 

............................

 

 

Nothing in that post is educating anybody. Most of what that post implies is that success is bad! and anybody who has more than someone else is bad too! So I guess if you want to start educating people then you need to list ways to fix the system. So take you best stab at being the new Adam Smith. But I'm going to go ahead and give you some advice, you won't change anything by just criticizing, youactually have to have a way to fix the problems if you want things to change.

 

And by the way, keeping the GTN clunky and difficult to use will only make it more difficult for you to make a profit off of your items you are selling. That's because people won't look at what something can sell for, they will keep posting it at the suggested retail price the game provides them with. Which will in turn make it easier for those that want to manipulate the market because they are going to figure out how to do it anyway. And those people are obsessive enough about it to jump through any hoop... just like in real life.

[GTN poorely developed]

there is no fun in real world economy. 4 ultimate investment companies control majority of all corporations on the planet. however the article for this is not inside the subject of this forum.

 

'real life' economy does not give any chance for the small time people (aka 90% of the people) to do anything. powerful few corporations dominate every sector and get their way. other people just scrape by.

 

Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Warren Buffett, Sam Walton. All people who made billions and were nobodies even though nobody has a chance in real life because of the megacorps "holding them down". Yes, there are 5 or 6 mega energy companies, 4 or 5 mega media companies that own all your media content and now about 7 or 8 huge banks that are deemed "too big to fail", but that doesn't stop people from being able to be successful on their own. That is just a cop-out for people who aren't either smart enough or hard working enough to justify their lot in life.

 

 

there has been no megacorporation in the history of the planet that went bankrupt after a bubble burst. even if a megacorporation, by scarce chance, goes bankrupt or becomes unviable, the majority shareholders just set up another corporation with the same staff and almost the same name and just keep going. many times, name does not even get changed - it is just sold through various legal maneuvers.

 

Tell that to people who owned Lehman Brothers, which failed hard; and basically every other major bank on the planet if the government had not stepped in to bail them out. And of course the owners of a failing business will restructure it. If they don't they fail - which is what is basically happening to RIM (Blackberry makers), they aren't adjusting with the times and Google and Apple are basically killing them. Point is, savvy people survive, people that don't change die.

 

if it was any profitable or fun, everyone would be playing stock market right now. we are not.

 

Plenty of people enjoy playing the stock market and those that are good at it are profitable. Typically those that aren't profitable at it don't enjoy it and those that are profitable do enjoy and tend to spend many, many hours analyzing information in order to know what moves to make.

 

 

there is NO value to be researched for any item. the market of this game is new, the people determine the value. it doesnt do any good or bad to have a suggested retail value. tho at least it evades people from mistakenly listing stuff for 1 credits etc.

 

Even though the game is new an economy is forming. If people aren't researching what people are buying items for then they have no idea what items are worth, thereby stunting the growth of the economy and the game. Yes, even when the economy stabilizes people do get into "undercutting wars". This is typically when you see one person buy up all the product and corner the market at their prices. This is not a bad thing. I see it as a very good thing as this is the introduction for most people of how an economic system actually is.

 

MMO's are actually great at showing the two dominant market theories in work. AH's and GTN's show capitalism at work. Most guilds share resources between members which is a form of socialism (what is funny is that in WoW, guildleaders could control the guild vaults, basically making them like the Kremlin in Soviet Russia by determining who got what and how much and when).

[GTN poorely developed]

gtn may be hard to use on purpose.

 

for, the easier it was made to use auctions in wow, the worse the market manipulation has become.

 

there were people just buying other people's stuff and bumping up prices and selling them from higher prices by cornering the item market. there were those who mass bought materials and mass manufactured items and sold them from minimal margins en masse, making huge profits but totally eliminating any potential profit for others.

 

all of these were possible due to usage of stuff like auctioneer addon and crafter addons. it just automatized all of these, and one person was able to manipulate and flood auction house as s/he wanted.

 

in the end crafting was totally pointless for any person who did not do the same.

 

if it took this much hassle to use auction house in wow, it wouldnt be like that. sure, they can use 3rd party software to do that - but if they do, it becomes a bannable offense.

 

You don't think this is what happens in the real-life economy? Basically, in my opinion, the more real-life like they make the economy the better. If somebody wants to corner a market then good for them, they take all the risk and sometimes reap a giant reward. But they can also be caught when the burble bursts and they go broke. Kind of like the large banks of the world, it's just that people in the game won't be labeled "too big to fail" and won't receive a government bailout.

 

Plus, SWTOR does not currently support add-ons so people would have to do the legwork that the add-ons you mentioned did for them.

 

By the way, while we are fixing the GTN, lets get rid of the asinine suggested retail value. This is causing the market for ALL items to be severely undercut by people that don't want to research the value of an item, which hurts the crafters of those items.

[GTN poorely developed]

The GTN is so cumbersome to use, I just list stuff for the default rate. It does need to be WAY better to use. I'm surprised anything is selling on there the way it is.

 

So you are why I have to sell an item at 1778 credits instead of the 3000 it is worth and will bring?

[Help.....Resetted Synthweaving and Archeology Skill]

I began with the crafting skill of synthweaving and then switched to cybertech just to check out if it was worth it but than when I reselected synthweaving I WAS RESETTED FROM LVL 1. Is that supposed to happen because as I recall that should not occur

 

Yes, yes it was.

[Who Crafts the Will Tanking Shield]

My Artificer can craft shield generators for Str and Aim tanks but not Will tanks (Shadow and Assassin). Does anybody know if anything crafter makes these or were these just left out? I can make offhand focus items that have will, just not shield generators. Was this just left out or does another crafter make these?