She is alright I suppose, 100x better than Khem, but definately no Mako. One thing I found very very odd. Kaliyo is the least effective companion of any of my characters, unable to take a hit or deliver serious damage. Yet the Imperial Agent is the slowest to gain a new companion. Second compaion by class: Sith Warrior: Malavai (Balmora Lvl 19) Sith Inquisitor: Andronikos (Tatooine lvl 27) Bounty Hunter: Gault (Tatooine lvl 27) Imperial Agent: ???? who knows, I have a lvl 35 IA and still haven't gotten my next companion after leaving Tatooine (I am actually a little worried that I may have killed her at the end of my last class mission). The worst part is I am 10+ levels behind my other characters in crafting. And still have to limp through missions with a companion that is neither a tank, healer, or DPS (Kaliyo does have a taunt, but don't make the mistake of setting it to auto-cast or you will be reviving her every battle). Personality-wise she is tollerable if you cater to her every whim, otherwise she will crawl up your bum.

I started with Sniper played to 16 and quit for Operative because Sniper was so fragile (literally was having trouble with class quests). Played Operative to level 32, but didn't like the play style, it was too melee focused. (I tried a sith warrior in beta and just don't like jumping around in melee, which exactly how the operative played, maybe even more so since some attacks are positional and you have to be behind your opponent). So I went back to my sniper and modified my strategies and build a bit. This is the class I wanted, a little ranged *pew*pew* machine. Although it does get a little frustartating knowing that the maximum range on my scoped sniper rifle is no futher than you can throw a light saber or jump in this game. And that even though I apparently do not know how to use a pistol I carry one around for shooting peoples faces.

I complained loudly about my sniper because in PvE and getting killed all the time. Primarily because Kaliyo is a horrible tank. But after taking some advice and changing my play style a little I have found my Sniper is very effective PvE both solo and grouped (especially grouped). My Sniper is lvl 27 and primarily Marksman tree. The defense buffs to cover (and breaking cover) are awesome. Here are some keys that helped me (I am no expert so feel free to correct any errors) 1. Kaliyo is a horrible tank, she can't take much damage. So I usually keep her in offense stance (it reduces her threat generation), so that she can remain alive the entire fight. I also turn off her Distract (taunt) skill and save it for when I am low on heath (remember you can manually trigger these abilities) 2. We don't have any long term Crowd Control, but we have lots of good short term. If anyone ever gets near me I Deabilitating strike them. If i'm getting too much heat from a group (or even one mob) use a flashbang and focus them down one at a time. 3. Remap the take cover keybind. By default your chracter will roll to the nearest cover, you can remap it so that automatically goes to cover where you stand instead of rolling (or you can use Shift+F). This made a huge differnce, once i disovered how powerful cover was and started using it more (cover - move - cover), i realized what a liability rolling around was, when I want cover I want it were I am at. 4. Balistic Dampeners (marksman tree, teir 2), this like a powershield, only better. 100% chance to absorb 30% damage against 3 attacks (and it has a buff icon so you know when it expires). I believe this is in addition to the default bonus provided by cover. 5. Snapshot (marksman tree teir 3), allows snipe to activate instantly when taking cover. This is great for pusing out a lot of burst damage, and when combined with Balistic Dapeners you stand/move then go back into cover now you have refreshed your Balastic Dapeners and get and instant snipe shot. 6. In long fights keep your Energy bar above 50% (actually 60%) to maintain good energy regeneration. In case you were not aware, the higher your energy bar the faster you regenerate energy, very important. It is easy to burnout on expensive shots, but you need to manage your energy to keep your sustained DPS up. Like the sniper says in TF2 Have a plan to kill everyone you meet. I like to open every battle with Ambush since it has a long activation and cooldown. I also like to use Explosive Probe right away since it is high damage, this gives me just enough time to squeeze off a 'fee' (not activation time) snipe, by this time Strongs enemies should ready for a TakeDown Shot (lvl 18 skill). I will admit that unlike my Powertech and Sorcerer, my Sniper is not good (or even able in some cases) to solo a Champion (platinum enemy) but here is how I like to handle other enemies. 3-4 normal enemies - practice a rotation, I like to exparament, sometimes using AoE, sometimes dps them down one at a time. these should not pose a problem. 2 normal + strong - Here you want a plan. using the strategy I described above you should be able to quickly solo down the strong while directign Kaliyo to engage the normals. Alternatively you can have Kaliyo engage the strong while you dps down the normals then assist her. 2 strong (silver) - you take one, Kaliyo takes one. (again you can burn them down fast with the above strat). 1 Elite (gold) - Elite vary enough that you may need to adjust your strategy, some are more resiliant or do more damage than others. Things to remember. 1) Refersh your Dampeners 2) occassionally have Kaliyo distract (taunt) to take heat off you. 3) use deabiliting strike or flashbang to give yourself time to activate Ambush. watch for them to use a special ability and interupt it with a stun or distraction (especially heals) 4) finally my filler attack for Elites is usually snipe and explosive probe when it is available. 1 Elite + 1 Strong - have Kaliyo engage the elite while you burn down the strong then assist. 2+ Elite - now you are in the heroic arena and proably need an ally since Sniper doesn't have long-term crowd control (unless they are droids, then you have slice droid)

Way too many skills. If my blaster had as many triggers as the number of differnt skills used to fire it I'd need 14 fingers to use it. The shear number of similar abilites makes combat tedious not exciting. I have several attacks that are nearly identical but on differnt cooldown timers, just so the game can force me to click different buttons. Then on top of that a slew of situational abilites that I don't use 70% of the time. A well designed and focused system really only needs 5-10 activated abilites. If you have to rotate through more than that, it is being artificially inflated. Here is an example of what I am talking about. what if you had ONE attack, in this case blaster, but you could modify its performance characteristics by dial up or down things like Range, Area of Effect, Damage, Energy consumption, activation time and cooldown. You could then save these profiles to a keybind. How many differnt profiles do you think you would need to create an effective attack chain? Do you think it would be more fun to design your own attack profiles or try to work around the large number of pre-esting ones? Do you think there would be more or less variety in attacks characteristics of differnt players and characters? (this is a mechanic simialr to CoX were you could add modifers to power that would increase damage or range or recharge rate, etc.)

I'm not saying it couldn't be done. I'm just saying you didn't do it. Based on the title of this thread I would have expected you to provide ample proof that you defeated the creature, including the log entry and loot drop. Not a screenshot of you and can Kaliyo standing over a corpse at full health. If you really wanted to make a statement stealth into a much higher level area and claim you killed something there.