Looking at the Columi set pieces available to me, I really don't see much upgrade potential as a powertech DPS. Why is there so much accuracy on our gear? You don't need that much, at least not in my experience... up to 5% or so I have a feeling I do MUCH more DPS in my current set (Itemized for surge>power>crit) that I've made collecting 56 enhancements from columi drops that aren't for my class. Or using 51 enhancements, etc. Same with the mods. The only part I can't make up for is the armoring, but the gain in secondary stats is more than worth it (after all, aim only increases your crit and damage.. which power and crit do a much better job of) Right now, with my own mix and match set of custom gear, mastercrafted implants and earpieces (The best itemized ones), Eliminator power gen, columi +power bracers and belt... I have 104.67% accuracy 31.52% crit 88.47% Critical Multiplier 650 Bonus Damage. I do crazy DPS. There isn't a tank on my server that can hold threat if I go all out using adrenals/trinkets. Guard is the only thing that can hope to make it manageable, and even with guard I pull threat at least once, almost always. (no threat management abilities) My HP kind of sucks, yeah (15k)... But I'm just wondering if there's any Powertech DPS out there in full columi or rakata that can chime in... because I'm getting really depressed about upgrade potential. Having to constantly run hard-modes and hope set pieces drop that AREN'T for your class is pretty messed up.. lol.. then you have to complete with that class for the drop and of course you can't take it from them.. takes forever to get a solid collection of 56 mods/enhancements.

You must be REALLY REALLY bad On my 28 concealment Operative, without acid blade/hidden strike/meticulously kept blades (ALL THE GOODIES).. I regularly top 10-49 wzs in damage, kills... regularly; with 1-4 deaths. You have so many tools; Use them right and you will absolutely own. If I can destroy almost every 10-49 wz I enter with an operative that doesn't even have all the goodies of the spec, then you most certainly can with them.

Add a daily heroic that gives a respec token. Make it a little hard, requiring a group or something. Make the token unique or something so you can only have 1 or two (maybe 3?) at any one time.. so people can't horde them and just respec over and over. I think that would solve the problem; It would throttle respecs (Which is what the credit cost currently does) without making it the ridiculous mess that it is now. As it is, my guild needs some fire DPS for hard modes.. so as a Powertech (some of the best endgame PvE dps) I respec DPS for my guild... inbetweem raids I want to tank some hard mode flashpoints.. respec right now is capped at 100k, this is way too much for a respec, esp when you factor in repair costs associated with nightmare content. So basically, we're forced into running dailies every........single..........day even when we no longer require any of the gear the comms provide, simply for the credits... and still struggling to maintain enough credits to pay repair bills.. Please, make this a little less hurtful

Have you even tanked for DPS in Rakata gear? I seriously SERIOUSLY doubt this. Every single powertech who plays at a high level (Nightmare modes) that i've talked to says the same thing. Eventually, you will HAVE to gear surge to maintain threat. Unless you can explain to me how a PT is able to pull 50%-75% of the DPS of a DPS class in full rakata, then it's simply impossible for it NOT to happen. If you read my first post, you'll see why. With threat being a static modifier of our DPS, as gear progresses, DPS classes will eventually ALWAYS generate more threat than us. If things stay the same. Tanks who gear purely defensive stats, that is. It's because even it your shield rating, defense rating, and absorb rating all DOUBLE... your threat generation stays the same. If a DPS's crit rating, surge rating, and power all DOUBLE, they are doing WAY WAY WAY more threat. So, please, explain to me how this isn't a problem? Explain to me how a powertech is supposed to maintain threat in this scenario? There is no magic rotation that increases your DPS by 50-75%. There's only so much you can do. I'm not saying EVERYONE has threat problems. What I'm saying is once DPS gear progresses to a certain level, it becomes impossible to generate more threat than them (if they are going all out, which they should be). This is a CERTAINTY for a tank gearing all defensive stats. The only way to 'tank' in this scenario is to use your emergency cooldowns, taunts, to regain threat... taunt gives you 110% of the threat of the highest person.. so basically you have to rotate your emergency taunts... this is not how it should be. Taunts should be used for emergencies, not consistently in every fight because the DPS has to go full throttle because of enrage timers. I'll say it again, if you're a PT tank..gearing all defensive stats, tanking for people in Rakata gear using stims/adrenals on Cooldown, you're NOT going to hold threat without taunts. At least not for any significant amount of time. Popping CDs at the start helps, but only delays the inevitable. It's a DESIGN FLAW that needs to be fixed. Either Defense/Shied/Absorb need some kind of threat component (increases the amount of threat done by abilities) to allow threat to scale with the DPS, or give Powertech's some 'High Threat' abilities that provide a threat number that isn't reliant on our DPS. If you really think PT threat is going to scale well (it already doesn't for DPS in rakata gear) then you are not really mathematically inclined. It's very obvious what the problem is, and why it is a problem. If you can't see this, I'm sorry, but it's a design flaw. They didn't think ahead when planning it out.

A DPS meter is required because all of the Hard/Nightmare content is pretty much based on enrage timers, that's it. Every single boss has an enrage timer. Not being able to see what kind of DPS your operation is doing, esp. seeing individual DPS, is a problem. When you're wiped for the 3rd time on a nightmare mode boss because of an enrage timer, you start to get a little pissed that you simply can't look at a DPS meter, see who isn't performing, and replace them. You have to guess and nobody is going to be honest "It's my DPS that sucks, sorry guys". You should be able to see how other people are performing; at least in Ops. As long as enrage timers are going to be the MAIN factor of HM/Nightmare content, there needs to be a way to find out who's doing subpar DPS to optimize the ops. Most HM/NM fights CC is not a factor, meeting an enrage timer IS. I could give a crap less about your ability to CC is your DPS is causing us to miss an enrage timer. Everyone should be using stims/adrenals on CD and trying to maximize their DPS, anyone not doing so should be removed. I hate not being able to see who's actually giving it their all, and who's just going through the motions. The only people who are against DPS meters are people that aren't confident in their ability to do well on them, or people who like being able to be lazy in a raid without anyone noticing. At least with DPS meters and you're doing subpar, you KNOW that you're doing subpar... with the way it is now, someone can be doing absolute crap DPS for their class/spec but think they're doing OMG UBER dps Here's the real kicker; without any sort of combat log or meter, it's impossible to see how you are even doing yourself. You have to fish around for anecdotal evidence, etc.. Pretty much guess.

The people above me must have pretty bad DPS if they are unable to pull threat from you using cooldowns/trinkets. A DPSer only has to do 150% of the DPS that the tank is doing to do this, because of the way threat works. If your DPS cannot pull 150% of your DPS, something is WRONG, because we have no DPS stats whatsoever. And this is exactly where the problem lies. We have no 'high threat' abilities, so our DPS basically IS our threat generation, with a % bonus. This was never a problem until DPS aquired Rakata gear. If your DPS is unable to pull threat off you if they are trying (going all out), THEY are doing something wrong, or they are undergeared. (My guild is all in Rakata pretty much, for reference) If you honestly have never lost threat as a PT tank, you need to find out what your DPS is doing wrong... be that not using adrenals on cooldown or cooldowns or something...because what it boils down to is that DPS only has to do 150% of the DPS that a PT tank is doing to generate more threat than them... and if you truly are wearing ALL tanking stats, this should be very easy for skilled DPS to do. I'm sure that my rotation is solid, I use the PT spreadsheet and theorycraft EVERYTHING. I'm the epitome of a min/maxer. I doubt it's an error on my part, maybe our DPS is just spectacular. This will only continue to get worse as DPS increases unless some other mechanic is added... that could be threat generation that is increased by defensive stats, or a number of other things. I do NOT want LOLEASYMODE tank that WoW became! I actually prefer the vanilla WoW model of tab targetting etc... but with the way the system is designed right now (at least for powertechs, I have no idea how much actual threat is given for the 'high threat' abilities of the other tanks... powertechs 'threat' is their dps) it's ONLY going to get worse.

As a PT tank, I have noticed that as the DPS gear gets better, threat becomes more and more of an issue.. I posted the reason for this on a couple of threads, but here it is. Now, the solution I am purposing is merely a band-aid.. it won't fix these problems forever because as teh DPS gear continues to get better/they generate even more threat, our DPS/threat is going to stay rather static (defensive stats provide no threat increase, but they should IMO) SURGE! As a Powertech tank, a good majority of our tanking abilities have high talent-induced crit rates. Surge scales VERY well. What I have found is that finding some pieces with def/surge, or implants/earpieces with shield/absorb/surge... or even using mastercraft pieces with Surge augments.. HELPS A TON. Like I said a lot of our abilities have high crit-rates, so we don't have to worry about gearing crit. Changing some gear around, I lost about 2% to shield, 1.3% to dodge, and 3% absorb.. But I gained 25% to my crit damage, meaning my rocket punches and flame sweeps all hit A LOT harder now AoE threat is no longer an issue because flame sweep crits for 1.2k Rocket punch crits for 2300-2400, 2800 with adrenal/trinket popped. It's working well for me, and I haven't noticed even a small decrease in survivability. TL;DR: If you're having problems with threat as a PT/Shieldtech tank, try to throw some surge into your itemization, you should notice quite a difference.

I will tell you what the problem is. I saw this coming the minute I started to level my powertech (been 50 for awhile now) here it is: As a Powertech tank, I noticed that our only increase in threat is a static % modifier of our DPS. As a tank, our gear choices consist solely of defensive stats. People who DPS gear for DPS stats. Defensive stats do NOT increase our dps, DPS stats do. Our threat is a static modifier of our DPS.. see where I'm going here? As the DPS gears up, all of the item budget on their gear is spent on DPS stats, so their DPS (and threat) increases significantly. As a Tank gears up, his DPS stays pretty static save for Aim gains. This is the problem. So, as a tank, we are expected to do 60% of the DPS that a DPS class can do.... that was all fine at teh start of the game... but as the DPS continues to gear up, their DPS continues to increase.. while the tanks DPS stays static. This is only going to get worse. I have been able to mitigate the effects of this somewhat; Here's a trick. GEAR SURGE I know it sounds counter-productive, but hear me out.. Try to find pieces with def/surge (there's def/surge enhancements).. try to get mastercrafted stuff and use Surge augments. Surge scales very very well, and as a powertech tank a LOT of our abilities have high crit-chances (From the shield-tech tree)... Surge causes our crits to become much much larger, without having to rely on a crit rating increase to make it effective. Surge will help threat problems immensely, but it's only a band-aid. Eventually, as gear gets even better, DPS will continue to increase; as tank threat stays static.

I will tell you what the problem is. I saw this coming the minute I started to level my powertech (been 50 for awhile now) here it is: As a Powertech tank, I noticed that our only increase in threat is a static % modifier of our DPS. As a tank, our gear choices consist solely of defensive stats. People who DPS gear for DPS stats. Defensive stats do NOT increase our dps, DPS stats do. Our threat is a static modifier of our DPS.. see where I'm going here? As the DPS gears up, all of the item budget on their gear is spent on DPS stats, so their DPS (and threat) increases significantly. As a Tank gears up, his DPS stays pretty static save for Aim gains. This is the problem. So, as a tank, we are expected to do 60% of the DPS that a DPS class can do.... that was all fine at teh start of the game... but as the DPS continues to gear up, their DPS continues to increase.. while the tanks DPS stays static. This is only going to get worse. I have been able to mitigate the effects of this somewhat; Here's a trick. GEAR SURGE I know it sounds counter-productive, but hear me out.. Try to find pieces with def/surge (there's def/surge enhancements).. try to get mastercrafted stuff and use Surge augments. Surge scales very very well, and as a powertech tank a LOT of our abilities have high crit-chances (From the shield-tech tree)... Surge causes our crits to become much much larger, without having to rely on a crit rating increase to make it effective. Surge will help threat problems immensely, but it's only a band-aid. Eventually, as gear gets even better, DPS will continue to increase; as tank threat stays static.

I'm pretty sure Bioware has changed the grappling into spawn to instagib ball carrier thing. I mean, it still works, but it's not NEARLY as consistent. I used to be able to play 'goalie' and effectively shut the other team down from scoring completely (until they got smart and didnt run up to the goal until they had full resolve) Today, after the patch, half the time I pull someone it scores. One third of the time they are pulled up there but don't die... I'll kill them and actually get the ball up there (You can run it along the sides up top, too).. the rest of the time they die and I get the ball (it doesn't reset) There's a little spot up there to the left that resets the Deserter debuff when you walk over it, Before the patch I would stay up there the entire game and play 'goalie'.. won almost every single match. it's still fun though, you can pull them up there, kill them, get the ball.. then you can run it along the ledges, have a sorc pull you over the pipe, and you can score without the enemy team even being able to touch you. Just have to remember to keep resetting your deserter

Why do you feel that adjusting shielding in PVP would be overpowered? It seems 'overpowered' that DPS stats are universally effective against ALL players, whereas defensive stats are effective against a select few. How is this balanced? If someone wants to use all tank gear, why should 80% of the stat allocation on their gear be an absolute waste when DPS stats are effective all the time, against all players. It would not be overpowered at all. A full Shieldtech build would be close to unkillable with a pocket healer; but that's how it should be. If you aren't able to put out enough damage to actually kill people, you should be a gosh darn TANK As of right now, anyone using defensive gear in PVP is doing it wrong. This is not how it should be. You should be allowed to make a choice and have benefits from the choice you make. Right now, the only choice that provides a solid benefit in PVP is DPS stats. This really needs to be fixed; I'm not expecting shields to work 100%.. I don't expect to reduce 50% of attacks done to me by 45%. I do expect to have more mitigation than I would in DPS gear, which simply isn't the case. As a 50 powertech with full epic sets of both DPS and Tank gear, and having done extensive personal testing... I notice absolutely *NO* difference in survivability when wearing DPS gear over Tank gear in PVP.. The ONLY difference is that I deal, on average, about 1000-2000 less damage per ability, and I have 1000 less Health. In Tank gear, I'm basically a guard/taunt/grapple bot, that's all I'm good for. In DPS gear, I can do all the guarding/taunting/grappling, but I'm also able to waste people in 4-6 GCDs.. so instead of standing around simply absorbing damage for my healer, I'm actually able to kill the 3 people attacking us, not just sit there and prolong our deaths. It's the very definition of unbalanced. There's absolutely no reason that I should live as long in DPS gear that I do in Tank gear, this is wrong.

Wow.. he barely does any damage... if this is the result of the nerf I seriously feel bad for operatives. My powertech that is parakeet (ST/pyro) does WAY more damage in that amount of time, and he's only has a single piece of champ gear.

Uhh.. we have ONE stun, the same 4s stun that every single class is given And if a Powertech is closing disstance, he's far up in the Shield-tech tree, so his damage won't be that great.. Now, I run Carolina Parakeet (Hybrid ST/pyro) that gives you the jet charge of shield tech, while still maintaining the free proc'd railshots from Pyro.. great spec and amazing in PVP. But we are nowhere near overpowered... The real problem is that all of us Pyrotechs are running around in DPS gear without any decrease in survivability. If they would make tank stats actually effective in PVP, a lot more of us Powertechs would be running full shield-spec and wearnig tank gear; as it stands right now, I live just as long as full Shieldtech in Tank gear as I do ST/pyro in full DPS gear. I still use my guards and taunt and put up 100-200k protection a game; except I also pump out 250-300k damage You want to know the real problem? Powertechs can kill sorc/sages, 60% of teh playerbase. Seriously.... Operatives were their hard-counter, so they complained until they were nerfed. Now it's powertechs, the last remaining class that can kill a sorc/sage reliably (Check their forums, you'll see for yourself.. ).. We should just all submit to our Sorc/Sage overlords.. with the best damage, healing, mitigation (shields), mobility (speed), control (hybrid spec has TONS of stuns/mez) in the game. Can't have a class that can kill them, now can we?

Shields count as healing and protection.

I honestly WISH I could. Of course I can't, so my claims are solely based from experience. From what I have seen, in the hundreds of warzones I've played, the most difficult to kill players are well-geared and effectively played Sorcerors and Sages. And not just for me, the entire team. I've seen countless warzones ending with (always) a sage/sorc sitting on 150-250k damage and 250-400k healing, on top of 75-100k protection, no other class even CLOSE. Sure, other classes will pump 300k damage, but no healing whatsoever. They also have the best mobility and control in the game. Like I said, if anyone seriously thinks the class with the best mobility, survivability, damage, healing, and control is balanced.... they should seriously rethink their assumption. I could care less to tell you the truth, my problem is that eventually 80% of the population is going to be playing sorc/sages as mains, you'll only need some tanks for PvE

Either you haven't PVP'd much, or you have only played against bad players. I don't use tank gear in PVP, no, because it's pointless to do so. Mitigation/defense stats are currently *broken* and don't really provide any sort of benefit in PVP.. defense a little, shield/absorb? Lol. A sorc who knows how to play, and uses his bubble properly, can survive more total damage than a tank. Easily. It's obviously very out of line.. just look at all the threads about it. Same thing happened with operative before they were nerfed, sorcs are just next on the list. We just need to continue to be vocal about it. Then again, maybe you think a class with the best control, damage, healing, survivability, and mobility is balanced? Eventually the number of sorcs will become even more ridiculous than it is now.. if things continue the way they are.

I don't get it. A *DPS* spec'd sorc/sage can mitigate more damage done to them than a tank in PVP with the way shields currently scale. Why is this? Why is a sorc/sage practically unkillable while my tank melts in a matter of seconds? Why are sorc/sages able to tank in PVP better than actual tanks? The way the shield scales is crazy at the moment. Seriously. Something has to give. Either nerf it or make it a talent in the healing tree high up. There's absolutely no reason that the 'glass cannon' should be mitigating more damage than a tank in PVP. With shields, sorc/sages can mitigate up to 15k damage vs a single person, in a single fight (multiple shields). When you see 3 dps unable to kill a sorc, yet the same 3 dps can drop your tank in under 4 seconds.. well; something is wrong. All this on the class with the highest mobility in the game, the most group utility, some of the highest healing and high damage. See the problem here? They get the best of ALL THREE WORLDS. They mitigate massive damage like tanks. They heal AMAZING amounts like healers.(I see sorcs regularly get 300-400k healing, no other class comes close) They go AMAZING dps like DPS. They are the holy trinity all in one (in pvp) On top of aoe knockbacks, friendly pulls, etc etc etc...and people wonder why there's so many? Want to tank in PVP? Roll a sorc. Want to heal in PVP? Roll a sorc. Want to DPS in PVP?.............roll a sorc come on this is seriously ridiculous

Yeah man... I just about **** a brick when I moused over 'heat blast' and didn't see any threat component to it whatsoever. I went through my tree, realized that not a single ability does additonal threat besides grapple... and starting to fear for the future of Powertech tanking. Why? That's simple; Scaling. Look at it this way; If all the threat we get is simply a static bonus % of our dps, and we have to stack defensive stats while the DPS is stacking DPS stats, eventually the DPS will completely overtake us; The small increase to aim isn't going to cut it while the dps doubles their surge/crit. I've always thought tanks should have an additional threat component to abilities that is modified by defensive stats. Let's take the stat defense for example.. it should have a modifier that increases threat generation of certain abilities (just threat, not damage). This is because as tanks are forced to stack defensive stats, our DPS doesn't scale with the raid; in fact, it stays rather static. Defensive stats should also boost threat generation ability, or else it's always going to get out of whack eventually (Unless you make threat generation LOLEASYMODE like other games have... where tanks put out so much threat that it's not even an issue)

But it's not fair whatsoever. If DPS classes are able to gear up with stats that effect ALL PLAYERS (crit and surge) then defensive stats should be effective against all attacks. My defensive stats are taking up all the stat allocation budget on my gear, but I'm getting about 20% of the mileage I get out of DPS gear. If DPS is allowed to increase their DPS through DPS stats in PVP, I should be allowed to increase my survivability through tank stats. If every single piece of my gear is top-end epic, and every single piece is full to the brim with defensive stats; I should be neigh unkillable with a healer. That's how it SHOULD be, because I can't kill anyone myself! Let me put it this way; X amount of DPS stats allows me to do X more damage in X amount of time. It should work the same for defensive stats; X amount of defensive stats allows me to receive X more damage in X amount of time. Right now, it's not working like that..here's an example. Let's say 50 crit and 50 surge rating will allow me to do an extra 10% more damage in a 30 second period or whatever. 50 defense and 50 shield should then of course allow me to take 10% more damage before I'm dead, right? But no, instead, 50 shield and 50 defense more realistically allows me to take maybe 2% more damage, because they aren't affecting anything. DPS stats are useful 100% of the time. Defensive stats are useful, what, 25% of the time in PVP? But yet there's the exact same amount of defensive stats on PVP gear that there is DPS stats. If it's going to be so much less effective, they need to drastically increase the amount of defensive stats on PVP gear, or increase the expertise on tank sets.. to make the stats equal to DPS in terms of effectiveness. I honestly do not thinking allowing shields to proc off all attacks would be 'game breaking' in the slightest.

There you guys go again with false information. Biochem's bonuses are NOT BIOCHEM ONLY. They simply have reusables of items that are freely available to everyone on the server via the GTN. "That no one else can achieve either through their products or other means" ABSOLUTELY FALSE You're are perfectly able to go and farm credits, buy a stim from the auction house, buy some adrenals, and buy some blue ultimate medpacks Now you suddenly have all the advantages biochem has...albeit in consumable form, but you CAN STILL GET IT, don't spread false information. The only 'bonus' biochem really has is the additional stats on the Rakata stim/adrenal. So, please, tell me how does that equate to not being abel to obtain the buffs that biochem has? You can also hire someone who is Biotech to make you stims, medpacks, and adrenals. These items are freely available to all players through trade.

I am wearing one on my tank (mastercraft), so yes, it is possible Veracity Powered Ultramesh Body Armor is also freaking ROCKIN' for a tank, hard to find anything as good, even with daily gear etc.. IF crit crafted

I agree COMPLETELY It turns them into basically virtual pieces of gear that you have to grind out stats for. I don't see much of a balance issue right now; If biochem didn't have the reusables, they'd simply be running Bioanalysis missions a lot of the time to get the mats to craft stims for themselves; the net effect would be the same, always have a stim active. Reusables simply just make this easier. What I feel needs to be done is that Stims and Adrenals should both have a green version ( i know stims already do) that craft about 5-7 at a time. Make green adrenals that are just about as good as the blue ones, lower the bonus of the rakata adrenals, do the same thing; craft 5-7 adrenals at a time for same amount of mats. Take all the first-level raid drop schematics for all other professions and PUT THEM ON THE TRAINER. This will let biochemists sell their wares. This will give people free access to all the stims/adrenals they can afford. This will make people feel like their given selection in crew skill isn't a waste because at least they can craft the first tier of good crap.

A common theme on this forum is everyone clamoring for crew skills to provide some sort of bonus when you reach 400 skill; Be that overloading a shield generator, increasing crit, etc etc etc.. everyone seems to feel that crew skills are supposed to give a bonus for maxing them. This is WoW mentality. This is something WoW did; It was called the profession normalization. It was not always like this. It appears to me that people have become to ingrained with WoW thinking that they pretty much EXPECT every trade skill to offer some sort of quantifiable bonus at 50. WoW did just fine without having normalized bonuses for years, why are all of the sudden they a requirement? I'd just like some people's thoughts on this, because it's kind of irritating. Crew skills are to craft and have fun, not to increase your stats even more (that's what gear is for) If one crew skills contains a nifty bonus, so be it; Why do we have to normalize everything to be exactly equal? Why can't we have fun little buffs here and there that are interesting? Nothing is interesting once normalization happens; Everything is carbon copy of another just with different wording. I don't want the crew skills in this game to turn into the stat-grind that WoW's professions have become; We enter a scenario where You HAVE to have trade skills because they provide a hard stat increase. Picking up crew skills should be entirely optional and not about getting some bonus simply because you reached max level. Everyone really needs to stop complaining.

When an item finishes during a zone (Like, there's 3 seconds left and you zone) and that same crew member crafting has items in his que, all those items will finish instantly. That's how to reproduce it. THere, I said it.

Thank god that crap is gone from the dev tracker. Hopefully there will be too much of an uproar for a large nerf... you can't just make ALL crafting completely useless. If they really do nerf biochem, they made the wrong decision.