What makes you unable to use combat technique as a balance shadow now? It is a balance only ability that was changed to now only work with force technique? Or is this more "techniques cost 100 force to change now so that clearly means I can't use other techniques!" ranting?

Works for me. I originally thought technique mastery was good, then saw that everyone was saying it's terrible and not worth it, so meh.

Tank stances make you gain 100% (or was it 200%) more threat. Meaning the lower DPS doesn't mean a thing for threat generation.

Seeing as a shadow has stealth and chooses their fights, there is nothing stopping them for waiting 5 seconds or so because they need to switch from shadow tech to combat tech. Also, the circling shadows thing was fixing a bug. Since forever it said it only worked in shadow tech, but it worked regardless of your technique.

Nope. You're in Shadow Technique 99% of the time as an infiltration spec. The other 1% of the time is when you're fighting an elite or a champion mob, then you go into combat technique for the extra armor.

Leveled as infiltration up to 38, respecced to kinetic combat, then went back to infiltration at 40. If you want to "play it safe" (IE never die ever) then sure, go with kinetic combat. You'll do reasonable damage, but an infiltration shadow will do much more. For PvEing as kinetic combat, the build is pretty simple: You take everything that increases your shield chance. http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#601rubckrskbs.1 Consulars start out with a tank companion, and get their healer around level 24-25, so I'd really recommend being infiltration up until that point, and then you can respec into kinetic combat. Otherwise, you'd just be at a disadvantage with two tanks.

How to kill sorcerers? You hit them until they die. They're starting at max range? You're doing it wrong. Shadows have stealth. Why are you running around without stealth? They're just healing themselves up? You have so many interrupt abilities they shouldn't be able to pull off a heal. They won't outdamage you just by spamming force lightning.

If they're going to blow their force cloak on a project and not on, say, the serious beatdown that gets delivered afterwards (either by the shadow or by the entire republic team), it's their loss. Because that means they're down force cloak, and every other project from that point on will hit them.

The funny thing is, most people are complaining about how he constantly hits on their characters, right? Well.. So yeah...

It'll work up until you get your healer companion, then you may feel forced into using that companion the rest of the game. Or at the very least against elites.

Nope. Most people just want to stand there and mash the '1' key on their keyboard because they're used to being able to macro all their skills onto a single button.

Again, like I said: Scoundrels/Operatives have better burst, while shadows have better sustained damage. You will probably have an easier time leveling up as a scoundrel because of the higher burst damage, though. Can't comment on the level 50 field, though. The only "evidence" against what I said was a clip of some guy not actually playing, but rather showing how often a scoundrel can crit if they have full crit gear, which isn't evidence at all. If you plan do some PVP, both classes will work well, you just can't run in with the "I'm a tank, therefore I can bumrush an entire team of players and not die" mentality.

Scoundrels have more burst, shadows have more sustained damage. As in, if you catch a shadow out of stealth, they're just as likely to kick your behind than if they started the fight from stealth and surprised you.

Tell me which changes are so life changing that you might as well reroll or respec because of how earth shattering they are. As of now I don't see anything other than changing techniques costing 100 force, so at this point I'm thinking all this is just, "wah wah I see a nerf I'm gonna cry and make it seem like it's doomsday!"

I wasn't aware that not being able to swap techniques/charges on the fly mid-battle for no reason other than to pretend you're better skilled than other players means that hybrid builds are being removed from the game. All it means is you might have to *gasp* WAIT a little bit when you switch techniques! Hardly killing hybrid specs.

scrapper scoundrels DO have less sustained DPS compared to other classes. The difference is that our burst damage is so insanely high and we have plenty of ways to stun/CC enemies that it makes up for it.

Why should you play a sniper over a sorcerer? ...Because you might want to? It's really as simple as that, unless your a super powergamer and absolutely MUST have the absolute BEST, in which case you're kinda screwed, because Snipers apparently have the best single target DPS and sorcerers are kinda a bit of everything.

Difference being the consular story was made with you being the good guy in mind.

Theran uses Holiday in his med watch stance, as well.

Here's the problem that most people aren't getting: All your doing is shadow striking the enemy. You've mentioned that three times in your post, one at the beginning with your "backstab dps", one in the middle saying you feel like you HAVE to use stun/low slash once focus is on you, and one at the end where you say we can't do damage unless we're behind them. You do realize shadows are a tank/dps hybrid, right? Since you have Theran, you should have no problems with any elite (gold rimmed) enemies any more, ever. This is what you're doing wrong: You're playing the game thinking the only thing a shadow can do is sit behind the enemy and use shadow strike. Use Theran, go into Combat Technique, fight them head on. If you're infiltration, ONLY use shadow strike when you get the find weakness buff. Think of it like this: Shadow Strike is USELESS unless you have the find weakness buff up. It uses too much force for the damage it does. If you still feel like we can't do any damage without spamming shadow strike, then you probably want to play a Scoundrel; they're the more traditional rogue class.

It's my understanding that while KO fills the resolve bar, it doesn't actually make them immune to crowd control. You're still able to throw in a dirty kick for another stun, THEN they're immune to CC. Of course, I haven't played my scoundrel in awhile, so I could be wrong.

sentinel/marauder's burn effects healing them is useless pretty much all the time. shadow/assassin's combat technique is better, but only if they actually use a healer companion with it. Neither is going to be able to let them tank or survive on their own when they get aggro and the healer is too busy. Neither will let you become some unstoppable force in PVP either. The healing on both is so low that maybe you'll be able to outheal a weak class enemy attacking you, but seeing as you need to attack the enemy to get it to proc, that weak enemy dies anyway.

It's because inquisitor has lightning! Pewpewpew! And mwahahahah, I'm a bad guy! I'm so awesome!

Is he an elite? Typically you'll want to be in Combat Technique against elites and aboves, for the extra survivability. Bringing some medpacks wouldn't hurt, either.

No same gender romances in TOR