No, mercs aren’t the problem in solo ranked. The major problem with solo ranked is the fact that assassin/juggernaut/powertech DPS can guard. A team with one or two DPS who can guard has a massive advantage over a team with no DPS who can guard. As a pub player on the harbinger, a lot of the solo ranked matches I get thrown into consist of 3 DPS and 1 healer on each side. I often get placed into matches with compositions like 1 assassin DPS, 1 juggernaut DPS, 1 merc DPS, and 1 sorc healer vs 1 sentinel DPS, 1 commando DPS, 1 gunslinger DPS, and 1 sage healer. In such matches, both the merc DPS and the sorc healer will be guarded, so our team has to try and burst down both the assassin DPS and the juggernaut DPS before we can even begin to kill their healer. Whereas all of their DPS can immediately start focusing our healer, since we have no DPS capable of guarding. It's essentially a guaranteed win for the imps, unless they make a major mistake. The imps in solo ranked understand this all too well, which is why 99.99999% of solo ranked games consist of at least one assassin DPS or juggernaut DPS who guards (actually, in most of my solo ranked matches lately two of the three DPS on the imp side are usually assassin or juggernaut). I see far, far more assassins and juggernauts in solo ranked than I do mercs. Unfortunately the pubs on harbinger have not caught on to just how game changing guard is in solo ranked, so the majority of the matches I get thrown into are unbalanced, with the imps having 1-2 guards and our side having none. I still try to enjoy solo ranked as much as I can, but it would be 100000000X more enjoyable if they would lock guard to the tanking discipline. Mercs may be stronger than they have ever been before, but the impact that they have on the outcome of solo ranked matches vastly pales in comparison to the impact that guard has on the outcome of solo ranked matches.

If only we could get them to copy WOW when it comes to making new raids....

To put it shortly and simply, raiders feel that the LEAST Bioware could do is allow us to get back into NiM Operations immediately with no interruption (i.e., no new gear grind) since there are no new raids. What I'm saying is it's unfair to force a gear grind on raiders if there are no new actual raids. Bioware should be compensating us by allowing raiders to immediately get back into NiM operations in 5.0. No new raids = no new gear grind. Basically.... have the gear grind for the people that care about gear for the sake of getting gear (why casual players want gear that they will never need is something I don't think I will ever fully comprehend, but I digress). But for those of us into progression raiding who don't care at all about gear, just let us get back into NiM progression raiding immediately. This could be accomplished by simply making 220/224 gear enough to complete all NiM operations, and having 216/220/224 tokens dropped by operation bosses as they were in 4.0. And that way only the people obsessed with gear will need to put in the time to get 230/236/242 gear via the CXP grindfest.

Question: Since there are no new operations with 5.0, what purpose does it serve to make raiders grind gear just to get back into the same exact operations that they were doing before 5.0? If there were actually new operations (with HM and NiM difficulties), then having a gear grind might make sense, as long as it was alt friendly. For example, maybe some altered form of CXP where everything is legacy wide, and every crate is guaranteed to drop a set bonus piece for your tier (based on your discipline), but you may still get duplicates. They could even keep the 300 command ranks divided up into three tiers(230, 236, and 242), but again with the CXP system being legacy wide and every crate giving you a set bonus piece for your current tier. This would still be more of a grind than the token system from 4.0, but much more reasonable than what we have now. I believe that the majority of the community would have accepted a legacy wide CXP system IF there was at least one new operation released with 5.0 (preferably two, since it has been two years since the last op was released). I mean, isn’t that how it is in any MMO… except for SWTOR? A new expansion is released and everyone has to grind gear again, but players accept this because there is a new raid that comes with the expansion. That’s what makes the new gear grind acceptable to raiders. That’s why games like WOW still have a healthy raiding population after all of these years. Not because people love to grind (they don’t), but because there is new challenging content (i.e., raids) that makes the grind worthwhile. This is why WOW Legion is considered to be a successful expansion, even though everyone is not necessarily thrilled with the rng system in WOW. The difference is SWTOR has the grind, but not the new content to make the grind worthwhile (uprisings are certainly no substitute for actual challenging and engaging content like HM/NiM operations, so lets not go there). There were no new raids in 4.0, but at least the gearing was easy to compensate for the lack of raids, so raiders stuck around. In 5.0, there is a massive gear grind to get back to where you were in 4.0…… all just so that you can get back into the exact same NiM operations that you were doing back in 4.0. And for raiders that are busy and only play during their scheduled raid times (usually 4-6 hours a week), it will take MONTHS just to get ONE character fully geared. The problem gets even worse if someone wants to be on, say, two different NiM raiding teams as two different roles (e.g., tank on one NiM team and healer on another NiM team). Basically, a lot of raiders actually feel insulted and disrespected that Bioware is throwing this horrendous gear grind in their faces, and not even giving us any new operations to make said gear grind worthwhile. It’s like a big slap in the face to all raiders. So I will ask my opening question to you again: Since there are no new operations with 5.0, what purpose does it serve to make raiders grind gear just to get back into the same exact operations that they were doing before 5.0? And one final point I would make is, casual players don’t need high-end gear (e.g., set bonus 230/236/242), because they are doing casual activities that don’t require said gear. So really, this new system benefits exactly no one, because it makes it possible for casual players to get gear that they will literally never need, and it is driving away raiders who see no point in a massive gear grind just to get back into the same content that they were doing in 4.0. PVP fortunately is ok for now since everyone is in the same boat gear wise, but it’s going to be a major problem in a few months when new players try it out and get wrecked because of their lack of gear. Basically, this expansion is going to have an extremely negative impact on all non-casual aspects of this game (HM flashpoints, master uprisings, solo ranked PVP, group ranked PVP, HM operations, NiM operations, etc.).

Why shouldn't mercs be able to click it off to get the heal earlier? Sorcs can do the same thing to control when bubble stun goes off.

Out of rage juggernaut, vengeance juggernaut, deception assassin, and hatred assassin, which is the best spec at being a "DPS tank" in solo ranked? By "DPS tank" I mean a DPS spec that guards people.

Do sorcs/sages still maintain their status as "best PVP healer" even with the 5.0 nerfs?

<Torch> (Republic) is looking for 1 healer (sage or commando) for its Gamma HM progression raiding team. Raiding days/times: Gamma team raids Tuesdays and Thursdays from 8:00 P.M. - 10:00 P.M. PST (server time). Healer requirement: Must be a sage or commando healer (we already have a scoundrel healer). Gear requirements: Full 220 raid quality gear (or better) is preferred, but having some 216 raid quality gear is also acceptable. General requirements: Know how to play your class/spec and role. Show up on time and prepared on raid nights. This means reading guides and watching videos on boss fights before raid night. Previous raiding experience is NOT required, but it is certainly welcome. Be willing to put in the necessary time to learn and improve. Have TeamSpeak and StarParse. The projected progression road map for Gamma team is as follows*: 1. Scum and Villainy Hard Mode 2. Terror From Beyond Hard Mode 3. Explosive Conflict Hard Mode 4. Dread Palace Hard Mode 5. Dread Fortress Hard Mode 6. Ravagers Hard Mode / Temple of Sacrifice Hard Mode / Nightmare Mode Operations Please note that this means that the focus of Gamma team is NOT on doing the priority HM op to get 224 drops, since gear is changing in 5.0. Instead, Gamma team will be focused on progressing through HM operations in order of increasing difficulty, with the goal of eventually moving into NiM operations. However, gearing will become a priority once 5.0 goes live. If you are interested in joining Gamma team as a healer, please get in touch with me. You can either send me a PM on these forums, and/or contact me in-game. My main character in SWTOR is “Volex”, and my alts are “Volxer”, “Voltexes”, “Voltexor”, and “Volxen”. I can also be reached at the following email address: volexswtor at gmail dot com Additionally, you will need to fill out an application on our website at the following link: http://torch.republicalliance.net/community/operations-application/ *This is the projected progression road map, but it is subject to change.

Isn't Wildstar pretty desolate itself? I was under the impression that game has a much smaller population than SWTOR.

<Torch> (Republic) is looking for 1 healer (sage or commando) for its Gamma HM progression raiding team. Raiding days/times: Gamma team raids Tuesdays and Thursdays from 8:00 P.M. - 10:00 P.M. PST (server time). Healer requirement: Must be a sage or commando healer (we already have a scoundrel healer). Gear requirements: Full 220 raid quality gear (or better) is preferred, but having some 216 raid quality gear is also acceptable. General requirements: Know how to play your class/spec and role. Show up on time and prepared on raid nights. This means reading guides and watching videos on boss fights before raid night. Previous raiding experience is NOT required, but it is certainly welcome. Be willing to put in the necessary time to learn and improve. Have TeamSpeak and StarParse. The projected progression road map for Gamma team is as follows*: 1. Scum and Villainy Hard Mode 2. Terror From Beyond Hard Mode 3. Explosive Conflict Hard Mode 4. Dread Palace Hard Mode 5. Dread Fortress Hard Mode 6. Ravagers Hard Mode / Temple of Sacrifice Hard Mode / Nightmare Mode Operations Please note that this means that the focus of Gamma team is NOT on doing the priority HM op to get 224 drops, since gear is changing in 5.0. Instead, Gamma team will be focused on progressing through HM operations in order of increasing difficulty, with the goal of eventually moving into NiM operations. However, gearing will become a priority once 5.0 goes live. If you are interested in joining Gamma team as a healer, please get in touch with me. You can either send me a PM on these forums, and/or contact me in-game. My main character in SWTOR is “Volex”, and my alts are “Volxer”, “Voltexes”, “Voltexor”, and “Volxen”. I can also be reached at the following email address: volexswtor at gmail dot com Additionally, you will need to fill out an application on our website at the following link: http://torch.republicalliance.net/community/operations-application/ *This is the projected progression road map, but it is subject to change.

Suppose there is a player who can play all three tanking classes (vanguard/powertech, guardian/juggernaut, and shadow/assassin) perfectly. Suppose he also has perfect/optimal gear and stats on all three tanks. He pugs flashpoints and operations a lot, and is often paired with average skilled (mostly sage/sorcerer) healers. On which of the three tanking classes (vanguard, guardian, or shadow) would he be the easiest to heal for the average skilled (mostly sage) healers that he is paired up with? Which tanking class would be the hardest to heal, and which one would be in the middle?

You mean 220 gear wouldn't be overkill for a HM flashpoint? I figured for sure that a set of fully augmented unassembled 216 PVE gear (the gear that you get from doing SM ops) should be enough to handle any HM flashpoint. Is even that not true -- are there some that really require a full set of 220 unassembled gear to complete? And I do primarily play as a tank, so since this something I definitely would like more insight on.

Well except as others have said, you clearly don't get bolstered as much in HM FPs as you do in SM ops. Everyone I've asked about it, both in-game and here in this thread, agrees that gear actually matters in HM FPs, whereas it doesn't matter at all in SM ops. I too thought that HM flashpoints and SM ops are supposed to be equal in difficulty since they are both "bolstered", but HM flashpoints are clearly far more difficult than SM ops. It's counter-intuitive because you would think that all bolster is created equal.

My understanding is that both SM ops and HM flashpoints are both supposed to be bolstered, but bolster does not seem to work as well (if it works at all) in HM flashpoints as it does in SM ops. For example, I tried tanking the red reapers HM flashpoint in mostly PVP gear (208 PVP gear that is augmented, with some 216 PVE gear mixed in) and I was hit extremely hard and killed very fast by the silver mobs in the beginning of the flashpoint. I then died to the next pack of silver mobs, and the two DPS members in the group started complaining about my PVP gear, which should be irrelevant if bolster is working as intended. So my question is, what exactly is going on with bolster in HM flashpoints? Is there some degree of bolster, but not as much as in SM ops? Does gear matter in HM ops in spite of the fact that it is supposedly bolstered? The two DPSers in the group were acting as though I should have been in at least a full set of 208 PVE gear for the HM flashpoint, so I'm trying to get an idea of how bolster works in HM flashpoints, or if it works at all. I also thought that gear doesn't matter in HM flashpoints since you can start doing them at level 50, where you can't even use end-game PVE gear anyways. On the other hand, I've never had an issue with being hit too hard or instantly killed by any of the SM ops that I have tanked to date. Certainly some of the more ops are more difficult than others in terms of mechanics, but my gear has been 100% perfectly fine for all of them. I would greatly appreciate any insight on this issue.

Even bubble mez (not really sure why it's called bubble "stun" when it's not a hard stun) is debatable at best. As a sage healer the two heroic utilities I take are 1) the one that allows you to cast healing trance on the move and 2) the one that reduces the cooldown of force barrier by 30 seconds (so it has a 2 minute and 30 seconds cooldown). Both of those utilities are, in my opinion, much more useful than bubble mez, considering how many people accidentally break your mezzes in this game. And with phasewalk on such a short cooldown, the ability to mez people for 3 seconds to get away isn't really all that important: if your truly being focused hard by, say, 3 or more strong DPS players, bubble mez is really just going to delay them for a bit, it's not going to stop them altogether. It's more efficient to just phasewalk out of battle, heal up, and then come back in. And then if you get focused hard again while phasewalk is still on cooldown, use your force barrier, and after using barrier phasewalk will be available again, so you need to go and reset it. Rinse and repeat until the warzone is over. The main components to sage/sorc survivability are phasewalk and force barrirer (the former more so than the latter because it has a much higher uptime). The most important thing is to always remember to reset your phasewalk after you use it (once it comes off cooldown of course).

Someone should make an all merc or mando premade guild called "Get Netted". That would be pretty funny to see in warzones.

How should healing be divided up in 8m operations? I am talking about op runs with a standard composition of 2 tanks, 2 healers, and 4 DPS. I am primarily a PVPer, so I am somewhat new to flashpoints and operations. I've healed a couple of 8m operations, and in the runs I've done so far there hasn't really been any coordination between the other healer and I as far as how the healing should be divided up. As a consequence, I will frequently find myself in a situation where a group member gets low on health, and I go to heal them with a casting heal only to see that the other healer already has healed them just as the cast is about to finish. A lot of heals end up getting wasted in this regard (for both the other healer and myself). So far I've only been doing SM ops, so it probably doesn't really matter there at all, but I do eventually want to start getting into HM ops. So, what is the standard practice on this? It would seem that having one healer focus on healing people on the left side of the ops frame, and the other healer focus on healing people on the right side of the ops frame, would be the easiest way of handling it (especially if each side of the ops frame has 1 tank/1 healer/2 DPS). Should I start suggesting that in every op group I join, or is there another approach that healers typically take?

Oh really, it won't automatically put 2 teams against each other if there are only 2 teams in the queue? Our guild was hoping to use group ranked so we could have organized 4 vs 4 matches against each other for practice purposes. We've currently just been doing regs together, but we want to start getting our feet wet in the ranked scene. But it sounds like we can't really use group ranked to practice against each other (at least not reliably) from what you have said.

Is group ranked matchmaking the same as solo ranked matchmaking? Meaning if your group queues as 1 tank/1 healer/2 DPS, can your group only get matched against another group that is also 1 tank/1 healer/2 DPS? Or does group ranked matchmaking simply take a group of 4 and match them against any other group of 4, regardless of composition?

In my opinion, at least since 4.0 hit, guardian/juggernaut tank >>>>>>>>>>> vanguard/powertech tank and shadow/assassin tank. The reason being that all tanks can do good damage now, but guardian/juggernaut tanks have MUCH more survivability than vanguard/powertech tanks thanks to their array of extremely powerful DCD's. In particular, in PVP endurance (not mitigation) is the name of the game, and guardians reign supreme here: with enure (endure pain), they get to have 30% more health 33% of the time (enure lasts 20 seconds and has a 60 second cooldown). That means guardians are the only tank that can boost their HP up to over 110k (I max out with enure at about 113K) for one-third of the time. In addition, we have focused defense (enraged defense) which allows us to actually benefit from getting hit by opponents as it heals us whenever we get hit by opponents. And those are just two out of the five DCD's that guardians get (7 DCD's in total if you want to count warzone medpacs and warzone adrenals). IF mitigation ever gets fixed so that it's actually relevant and reliable for PVP (as it is for PVE), then shadow and vanguard tanks could make a comeback in the survivability department. But as it stands right now, defense/shield/absorb is considered useless for PVP, and both shadows and vanguard tanks are designed around high mitigation builds (shadows because kinetic ward increases their shield chance by 18%, and vanguards because their energy blast increases their shield absorption by 25%). The problem with shadows is that they have low damage resistance (DR) against kinetic and energy damage because of their light armor (although they do have some good DCD's such as resilience/shroud, but still not as good as guardian DCDs). And vanguards do have slightly better damage resistance (DR) than guardians, but their array of DCD's is horrendously lackluster: reactive shield is on a long cooldown (2 minutes), and adrenaline rush is really not that great of a DCD, and it's on an even longer cooldown (3 minutes). That's really all vanguards get. That's my assessment of the tanks at least. There is really no point in playing a shadow tank or a vanguard tank, because however good you are doing you could be doing even better on a guardian tank (with the caveat being that it's easier to do damage on a vanguard tank since it has more range and less buttons to press). It's like the healing situation: sure you can play a scoundrel healer or a commando healer and perhaps do well if you are extremely good, but you would be doing much better if you just played a sage healer. The sage healer and guardian tank combination is bar none the strongest healer + tank combo in the game. TLDR: Guardian tanks will continue to be far ahead of the other two tanks until mitigation (defense/shield/absorb) is fixed for PVP, since both vanguard and shadow tanks are designed around having high mitigation through high shield chance and high shield absorption.

What you are talking about is griefing, not open world PVP. And most, if not all, true PVPers fully agree with you: it should never have been possible to "trick" someone into flagging (on a PVE server, or now on a PVE instance) by stepping into their AOE while flagged. They did however fix that particular exploit a long time ago -- long before this new PVE/PVP instance was introduced. True open world PVP is consensual among all participants. And when it is done right, it is some of the most fun that you can have in this game.

I would also just like to add, for players reading/posting in this thread that may be new to the game, that open world PVP used to very much so be a huge part of this game, before the PVP servers (i.e., Bastion, Prophecy of the Five, etc.) completely died out. Prior to transferring all of my characters to the Harbinger, I used to play on the Bastion. Back in 2011-2013, MASSIVE open world PVP battles used to happen all of the time on Tatooine. It was a regular, if not daily, occurrence for level 50-55 (depending on what the level cap was at the time) players to form very large ops groups (often 20+ players) on Tatooine, and raid outposts and bases/spaceports of the opposing faction. This would eventually lead to a response from the opposing faction, which made for some very large and interesting open world PVP battles. And no, these weren't pre-planned events; it was all spontaneous and spur of the moment. You could usually find PVP action by just heading to the dune sea and checking on outposts Thorazen (republic) and Zorasche (empire), and from there find an ops group to join. There were even raids conducted on both Anchorhead and Mos Ila on a regular basis, as players found ways to get around the exhaustion zones and invisible walls preventing direct access to those bases/spaceports. It was some of the most fun that one could ever experience in this game. It was certainly more fun, interesting, and dynamic than just doing warzones 24/7. This carried on into 2014, although to a lesser extent. Some time between 2014 and 2015 is when the open world PVP scene (along with the server itself) on the Bastion died out. I'm not exactly sure when it happened, as I took an extended break from this game around that time. Sadly, that kind of thrilling and spontaneous open world PVP simply does not exist in this game anymore.

Why is that any more surprising than people being entertained by only doing PVE (and there are certainly a number of people in this game that don't PVP at all)? Yes, there are people that play this game purely for PVP. In fact there would be a lot more people playing PVP (both warzones AND open world PVP) if the devs would just do the following: - Merge all of the U.S. servers into one megaserver - Merge all of the European servers into one megaserver - Make all of the warzones cross-faction (this has the dual effect of making wz's pop faster AND it helps to deal with the premades stomping pugs issue) - Balance all classes (i.e., buff scoundrel and commando healing, significantly buff commando survivability/escapes, etc.) - Add objectives and incentives for open world PVP (e.g., rewards for attacking/defending bases/spaceports/outposts, etc.) - Remove all invisible walls and exhaustion zones, such as around Anchorhead (republic) and Mos Ila (Empire) on Tatooine -- people want to be able to raid bases and spaceports, not just outposts (and Tatooine has historically been one of the most popular, if not the most popular, planet for open world PVP) - Add more guards to the bases/spaceports/outposts, so that way it's not easy for a small group to take over a base, but rather requires a larger group to succeed (this encourages players of the same faction to form large ops groups for raiding and taking over bases/spcaeports/outposts of the opposing faction) - To help balance the two factions, give players some incentives/benefits for playing on the lesser populated faction (which is the republic for most or all servers)

The thing is, the website www.dulfy.net has guides that give the optimal rotation for each class/discipline. On top of that, there are several DPS disciplines that have easy rotations, which are really more of a easy-to-remember priority system rather than a rotation per se (e.g., gunnery commando and tactics vanguard fall under this category). Are you saying that even in spite of websites like www.dulfy.net, there are still a lot of players doing HM content that don't know the rotation for their class?

That's good to know, as I didn't realize the change was so devastating for PVE as well. If even PVErs are unhappy about the 4.0 stat changes, then perhaps it will get revered back to how it was prior to 4.0 (fingers crossed).