Here is the problem I have with this cost, it is a plently to people who just don't play the economy. There is a guy in our guild who plays when he can (has kids a job,etc) but is a super nice guy and raids with us on alt farm night. He wanted to change his appearance but to do so would have cost him the large price of the augment removal, plus the cost of buying augmented gear (on server it goes for around 200-250k per peice). We ended up giving him some credits so he could do it. But that is just ridiculous. I went through over a million plus mat cost to make augments for my new PVE and PVP gear. I understand the need for credit sinks, but this cost should be far lower. There should just be a set price for removing all the peices (say 50k) and then have the price to remove only one mod at the usual 40k a pop. This isn't really a good credit sink since most poeple will only do it once. Better would be speeders that aren't just recolors of the same model or animal mounts. The fact that augments are a large help to stats means they are necessary, not cosmetic.

I notice not a huge difference in pvp. Ammo management is still the biggest concern, but in the end it comes down to whether or not my team tries to protect me. No matter how OP a healing class is if you are being focused by 4-5 players you aren't going to last. I think a lot of the problems in pvp seem worse because of the buffs to other dps classes. My server has a large populations of marauders on the imp side and they can easily drop me if I don't get a little back up. I have found the changes in pve to be slightly more annoying. Ammo management went from a skill to basically just trying not to cast. Attempting the new HM lost island I found the 4th boss (special project whatever) to be as aggrevating as possible. Since everyone has to spread out on the consoles and are all taking damage I have to spam heal everyone, leaving me almost without ammo the entire fight. It doesn't make the fight more challenging it just makes it more annoying. Ops I have noticed a similar problem. I understnad the nerfs to our healing abilities and damage mitigation, but I don't get why they had to change our ammo management. Giving us back the AMP reducing MP by 2 is a small buff which isn't going to suddenly make us OP. As it is now we have to invest 3 points into FT to get back 1 ammo once every 8 seconds. That's a pretty steep price considering Field Training how it's value halved as well. BW please look back over the changes you made to CM. The community seems pretty united on this and most of us just one back our 1 ammo.

If they really are nerfing BH/CM so that people are more likely to take Ops/Scoundrels then that is the worse logic I have ever heard. They are saying that one class doesn't have enough people playing it so they will force everyone to stop playing another class to make Ops/Scoundrels look better? How can that possibly make sense. If people aren't healing as Ops/Scoundrels then look at that class and see why. Is the rotation boring? Are they under powered? Are the other dps trees for those classes to good to not go dps? There can be tons of reasons why people aren't healing as a certain AC the right answer isn't nerfing the other healing trees. The changes to Sorc/Sages are pretty bad as well (not sure if they net as large as a healing loss as these trooper nerfs or not). It really seems like this was either done to make people play a class that people weren't interested in (I have played with good smuggler healers and they aren't lacking) or this is how BW plans to make content more difficult. If the former is true, than BW's answer to the problem of one AC not being used enough is to make another AC not used enough. If it's the latter it says BW does not understand the MMO market or what people really want from content. They don't want the content to be challenging because they have been nerfed, they want an encounter to be challenging because of the mechanic of the fight, the strategy, the timing. If these changes are done to make more people play Ops/Scoundrel healers than buff their classes, make them more fun to play or more dynamic. If these changes are to make content harder, go look at other MMO's boss enccounters, create interesting and challenging mechanics for fights. Nerfing classes in an MMO should be a last stop becuase all it does is anger your player base and usually result in "flavour of the month" class changes. And when it comes time to nerf a class, start by saying why. Don't just throw up nerfs and look the other way. BW needs to learn from its mistakes, not keep repeating them.

My first post was a lil rambling i admit. There will be little buff to the player economy other than the first few weeks, but once people get the look they want (or in the case of people who don't really care the first piece of augmented crafted gear they can find) the economy dries up. All this will do is make mats and orange gear with augments worth a lot for a short peroid of time. It will also make all other types of gear worthless so you won't even be able to sell most gear on the GTN for even a small profit like now. BW has failed at making most endgame gear look good enough you want it and this makes their efforts wasted. If endgame gear came with augment slots maybe it would be worth it to keep them, as it is you would have to RE the purple, hope you learn the schematic, get the mats to make multiple of them until you crit one with an augment and then wear it, versus just wearing that same orange you already had on you. Not to mention there are several looks that are not craftable and will keep people from using them. The augment system will also just be another level of gear checking for people, which BW is so fearful of.

Healing what? PvE content? PvP? HM? NMM? That statement seems vague it is curious if you actually play a CM. The more I think about these nerfs the less I feel they are justified. CM have always been at a slight disadvantage to the other healers with a lack of a combat res and no true interrupt for pvp. I have gone and played 10 wz since my previous post and have seen how it will require some changes to my mode of play and require must more liberal use of hammer shot, which is frightening as it is a big green line that tells dps to nuke you and unless you have a premade chances are your pug allies won't make an effort to keep dps away from you. After watching a sage in my guild play and checking his scores I have become even more disillusioned with these patch notes. We are of the same skill and roughly same gear level. He is able to out heal me with relative ease while still being able to stand up in 1v1 fights. Most of the time in 1v1 I just have to heal myself till the other player eventually dies from my random attacks or reinforcements come to save me, especially if I am up against a full geared battlemaster. I don't know if BW has thought this out all the way, there are guilds that may indeed sit their CM from NMM because they need the better heals of the other classes. What I really can't figure out is what brought these nerfs on, but not nerfs to sages. If it had been an across the board heavy nerf to healing specs I would understand, but as it is sages received a slight nerf in the form of an increased cast time, that's hardly the level of the nerf sent against CM. If it was about PvE balance I don't see it as CM aren't a must have, but are a nice and available alternative to bringing two sages. In PvP any trouble people have killing a CM they will have against a Sage or a Scoundrel, especially if they don't know what heals to interrupt or when to use their stuns. Force armor + speed can save a Sage countless times. A CM has to eat the damage and hope for the best. I don't buy the argument that there are just to many Troopers as BW has said that Inq are the most played class in the game and they did not receive a heavy nerf to all their trees. In the long run these are just the first round of patch notes and hopefully BW will do some research before they potentially bench a whole class.

The main problem with this system is that it will make Armormech and Synthweaving the new version of biochem from launch. BW has said they want to move away from having a must have endgame profession, but this will be what the majority of people take with a few members of guilds filling in the one or two other needed professions. The other problem with this system is that it makes orange quest rewards somewhat pointless. If you are a crafter and crit on a pair of pants you will most likely just wear those pants until you reach 50 and spend the time and credits needed to get the look you want. That means that heroic quest rewards become nothing more than containers of mods/enhancements. With this system they might as well just make endgame bosses drop just the item enhancements and not waste time having an art team and modelers making endgame gear most of the user base will never use. This of course does have its benefits because the art design of end game gear (especially the new tier) is pretty laughable. Another issue is that any gear that isn't moddable becomes completely worthless and makes leveling crafting fairly a waste of money and time since you will rarely make something you actually want. A good solution would be to simply make it that only lvl 49 restricted orange gear can crit an augment slot, but then that removes the choose your look idea they are tryng. They also need to look at making other professions more worthwhile. Maybe allow augment crafters to crit and give a special item that allows you add an augment slot to a piece of gear that doesn't have one already. All in all the easiest solution would be to just remove augments all together. That makes your choice of gear your choice cause no matter what you are going to look at least a little silly.

I won't unsub becasue of this, but it has really made me question how much I will continue to play. I leveled a JK as Vig DPS and haven't really been that excited by it, it seems the JC in our guild can easily out dps me in most fights and the play style for the JK is really lacking sometimes. I rolled a CM trooper to level only as pvp and have enjoyed it a lot. I feel more like I am contributing when I am on my Trooper in a wz then when I am on my JK dpsing. I have come to really enjoy healing and learning how to manage my ammo while still maximizing my healing. I wasn't expecting much from 1.2 as far as a buff to the class. I was hoping they would up the number of people KB could heal and that was about it. I was surprised to see these changes that were in the patch notes. I'm not going to QQ and say BW is stupid or anything like that, I just want to see some justification for these changes. On my server there are a decent amount of troopers, but there aren't many CM and there are only a few who really are good healers. Like I said I leveled my CM through PvP and doing my story quest, so I have had a lot of experience there. I can keep myself alive against an average player 1v1, but it is a long fight and takes forever for me to kill them. If I go against a skilled player in similiar gear they can beat me by knowing when to interrupt and stun and when to use knockbacks. I'll eventually run out of ammo and they can kill me. In most WZ if there is a compotent Sage they will almost always beat me in total healing and usually double me in damage. They are far better utility players in PVP, especially with force speed in Huttball. I have always just accepted that Sage's are a better pvp class and I need to focus and really get to know what I am doing to constantly top the healing charts and I have enjoyed doing that. There is nothing like beating a skilled Sage at the end of a round. In PVe I have found that a lot of HM are easier with a Sage, since they have a better AoE heal and Force Armor is a huge perk, not to mention CM having no combat res ability. Again though I have tried my hardest to be the best trooper I can be and the challenge is what I have enjoyed. The nerfs here are going to change all that. In any heavy damage situation (pvp or pve) I have the chance to blow through my ammo to keep someone up. With these changes CM will be out of ammo far quicker and with limited abilities to return ammo. As it is I don't see CM being competitive at all in either PvP or PVE with these changes. I don't understand the removal of the healing buff and armor buff from our abilities. I don't understand how they justify 3 points for a 1 ammo reduction skill or how they still refuse to give troopers a combat res, when even DPS smugglers have access to one. If these changes go through I will probably lose my enjoyment of being a CM and just go and level some alts and once I hit 50 with them I'm not sure there will be enjoyment enough to stick around. If BW can show that Trooper healers were OP and were being taken over Sages/Smugglers as healers, than maybe I will understand. But from what I have read and seen, CM were not that OP and were never the must have in any Ops group. Super disappointed in a patch I was really looking forward too. Especially when looking at the lack of such large nerfs on other healing classes.

I could be wrong, but I thought in the SWtOR novel "Revan" they tell you that the Emperor is a Pure Blood Sith, which he clearly isn't in the final fight. Did anyone else read the book or am I completely imagining him as a pureblood. I really doubt that BW will allow arguably the most important character in this timeline be killed by one specific class. There has to be a raid. Although I could be wrong with what they did with Malgus and Revan maybe they just don't care. Would still be odd though. Also, when you first meet the Emperor doesn't he have the weird brain head appearance? Or did my game just decide to give him no face? If he did it means he can clearly take over different bodies and perhaps the death of one of those bodies is a crushing blow. Also, Scrouge isn't really that trusted, his position is partial punishment for what he did with Revan. Also, they don't get 100% beat by the Emperor as Scourge kills the Exile.

I would say leave an augment slot off of armoring mods. Also I guess just allow barrels and hilts to be made with an augment slot. I think over all that would make armstech and artifice a lil more worthwhile.

I have had gear drop that no one could use at all. I also solo'ed Esseles to try and get the lightsaber that drops at the end because I like how it looks and it dropped a scattergun. What I notice more is that whatever class gear the first boss drops, the rest of the bosses drop the same class. I did a run of Taral V with a group of two jedi (one dps one tank) a smuggler and a consular (healer). All bosses except one dropped sage gear, the only exception was an implant for a jedi knight. We than went and ran Maelstrom Prison and the exact samething happened again, all sage gear except two drops (one for a trooper no one could use) and a jedi knight light saber. A week later we ran a guildmate through Maelstrom Prison and the same sage was with us. Again all sage drops but an ear piece for a jedi. The final boss dropped two pieces of sage gear. A lot of my guild mates have noticed that it seems a flashpoint picks one classes and drops almost exclusively gear for that class only. I have a feeling this is a bug in the loot tables and should be addressed.

Right now augment slots can only appear when a player "crits" while crafting a piece of armor, a weapon, or an off hand. This is a nice lil bonus stat, but it makes augments worthless at endgame level. If players who can make barrels, armor mods, hilts or enchancements have the chance of critting on these to add a augment slot it would make these more viable in the end game and make some of the less attractive professions look better. There would be balancing concerns, but I'm sure there would be away to make it so that a player can only have x number of augments equiped at once. Allowing hilts and barrels to count for augment slots would be a nice way to make these professions a little more attactive to players.

Social Gear should take on whatever type of armor your class wears when purchased. It is all Bind on Pickup so it shouldn't be too hard. Could even be based on what mods and enchancements you put in that changes armor. Socia Gear is for people who want to look a certain way while they play the game. If you weren't supposed to be able to use Social Gear as actual armor than it shouldn't have been moddable. Seems silly there is a trooper officer uniform that is only light armor. Give people the option to wear these cool looking outfits and actually be competitive. It is only penalizing certain classes now as light armor classes can wear this gear with no problem. With the changes to gear/mods, people will be able to take end game gear and switch it over to gear they just like the look of. Let Social Gear be usable. Otherwise what is the point of grinding for social points to get some gear you will only wear sometimes when you are making auctions at the fleet?

PvE rewards are different all together. Random drops make doing the same Operation multiple times worthwhile, every piece of gear that drops helps your raid group even if you don't get that piece of gear. There is a point where the randomness of Boss drops becomes annoying and futile. That is the point PvP gear is at right now. The randomness is fine, but they should make small changes. THe different kinds of tokens is needlessly complicated and is hard for non-MMO veterans to even figure out. One set of commendations which let you by the purple quality bags which should then include either a token for pvp tier or a higher level of commendations for the lower end pvp tier gear.

For the record, most people saying they can get it to work are running XP, which for whatever reason works. This is obiviously not an option for most pc gamers as XP does not support most modern hardware (IE the amount of RAM it can recognize and use is limited, video drivers not working properly with xp etc). It would be very helpful if BW could help with this issue, but I don't see them directing coders to fix an issue with all the work they are doing with the launch and patches. Steam is really the last hope and the post on their forum have received no official answer. The tension between EA and Steam certainly isn't going to make this a smooth process. I have heard of people having success by having steam launch origin and then whatever game you are playing throuhg origin you can use the steam overlay. I have not tried this, but have spoken to people who have gotten it to work. It is also probably not likely that even an addon (if BW allows them for swtor) will be able to fix this as Steam releases none of the programing code for their chat services. This has stopped people from being able to make a mobile version of steam that works with chat. The best thing to do is to make post asking BW to help in anyway they can and make similar post on steams forum and keep your fingers crossed.