I know there's major concerns with BoP items being allowed in Legacy Storage (Lost monetization, drastically reduced gear grind time, etc). But you do realize that Legacy Storage won't solve the MAJOR storage problem that many of us are facing. The problem is that I have nearly 5 Cargo bays full of bound items, most of which can't be reacquired or have a very steep repurchase cost or a require a large amount of effort/time to reacquire. Also your Collections/Cartel Market system essentially forces you to hold on to any gear you've equipped, but not unlocked the whole set for in Collections. So, two questions/Suggestions: 1. If you're not going to allow BoP items in Legacy Storage could you please increase the number of regular Cargo Bays then? 2. If I have more than 50% of a Collection, could you add moderately expensive option to just unlock the rest of the set? I.E. If I have the Revan's Mask, Chest Plate , and Robes I could pay something like 1,000cc to unlock the other two items in the set. The only upside to Legacy Storage right now is that it reduces the need for alt storage of crafting materials, boosts, companion gifts, etc. Which is a very welcome addition, but not everything I hoped for.

Greetings from /r/SWTOR. Congratulations on the job!

They didn't give a whole lot of answers that we didn't already know. But the live stream format provided a little more insight into their process, and the opportunity to ask questions directly to a developer responsible for class changes. Other stuff mentioned was that they only really have time to work on 3-4 classes per patch cycle. I think it was Deception Assassins and their equivalent that got their changes pushed back to 2.9, because they just didn't have time this patch. Also they mentioned that they have at least a top 3 classes/specs that are slated for work in 2.9, and they include the aforementioned Assassin spec and Lethality Operatives. Guardians/Juggs got an explanation of their cooldown nerf in duration due to imbalance in PvP. And a few other answers I can't think of off the top of my head.

Operative Discussion Post. From Dev Stream today: (Full Video Link) Link to Operative Discussion Time (37m17s) Surprise Comeback/Pugnacity 4 tick bug was fixed for 2.8. I got in a question about Surprise Comeback turning Pugnacity into a half dps and half defensive ability, and suggested Surrender as a good place to put it instead. The response was they generally don't like creating these dps/defensive abilities. They examined a few places to put it, and decided to put it in Surprise Comeback for now. That may be re-examined, but the cooldown/healing/defense bonus would need reconsidered if moved to another ability. Dirty Fighting is one of their top 3 specs to look at buffing/fixing issues for 2.9.

From Dev Stream today: (Full Video Link) Link to Operative Discussion Time (37m17s) Revitalizers/Stim boost 4 tick bug was fixed for 2.8. I got in a question about Revitalizers turning Stim Boost into a half dps and half defensive ability, and suggested Countermeasures as a good place to put it instead. The response was they generally don't like creating these dps/defensive abilities. They examined a few places to put it, and decided to put it in Revitalizers for now. That may be re-examined, but the cooldown/healing/defense bonus would need reconsidered if moved to another ability. Lethality is one of their top 3 specs to look at buffing/fixing issues for 2.9.

From Dev Stream today: (Full Video Link) Link to Operative Discussion Time (37m17s) Revitalizers/Stim boost 4 tick bug was fixed for 2.8. I got in a question about Revitalizers turning Stim Boost into a half dps and half defensive ability, and suggested Countermeasures as a good place to put it instead. The response was they generally don't like creating these dps/defensive abilities. They examined a few places to put it, and decided to put it in Revitalizers for now. That may be re-examined, but the cooldown/healing/defense bonus would need reconsidered if moved to another ability. Lethality is one of their top 3 specs to look at buffing/fixing issues for 2.9. Separate discussion topic link.

Snave stepped up to organize this as both Operative and Scoundrel reps and their backup reps stopped playing. A job that only a few would choose to do. Any criticism leveled at him for being a "bad rep" should take this into account.

Snave admirably gathered, analyzed, and distilled the community concerns into 3 basic areas of interest. Then filled in the background for each area with supporting information, and community suggested fixes. Eric felt, and I can see his side as there were a lot of rhetorical questions, that the questions needed "simplification." I.E. the background information, meant to provide insight into not only what we were asking for but why we were asking for it, was cluttering up the actual questions. I'm hoping for the best. But as it stands, I'm going to put forward the following template for future Community Reps to use. 1. ___________. Others classes have it, we don't. Fix please? 2. We can't ___________ fast enough, ___________ long enough, or ___________ others enough to matter in ___________. Fix please? 3. ___________, ___________, and ___________. Fix please? And our questions rephrased in this format: 1. Raid utility. Others have it, we don't. Fix please? 2. We can't kill stuff fast enough, live long enough, or help others enough to matter in Ranked PvP. Fix please? 3. Bugs, RNG, and silly ability restrictions. Fix please? You'll probably get the same response, and spend less time worrying over how to phrase your question!

As someone who's played Lethality/DF a lot in PvE. I feel Weakening Blast/Hemorrhaging Blast is not the right place to add TA/UH generation. If anything giving Overload Shot/Quick Shot the ability to proc TA/UH on a 6 second shared ICD with Shiv/Blaster Whip for all Operatives/Scoundrels would be more fitting. Unlike the WB/HB change, the OS/QS change would not change your priority/rotation at all. You wouldn't have to worry about losing your extra TA/UH stack by using WB/HB at 2 stacks. You wouldn't have to worry about balancing the effect of an extra TA/UH stack on stationary fights. They have nearly the same energy cost as Shiv/BW, 17 vs 15 energy, so not much change in energy management. And it would also give us a reason to use OS/QS finally. If you want to take it one step further, increase the range of our 10 meter damage abilities to 15 meters. This would allow us greater mobile DPS and survivability for Lethality/DF.

Given feedback in this thread, this is my pared down plan for making Lethality/DF a mid-range spec: Increase Cull/Wounding Shot's, Weakening Blast/Hemorrhaging Blast's, and Overload Shot/Quick Shot's range to 18 meters via a passive Advanced Class ability. Use of Overload Shot/Quick Shot on an Operative/Smuggler would generate one stack of Tactical Advantage/Upper Hand with an internal cooldown of 6 seconds shared with Shiv/Blaster Whip. Change Fatality/Unfair Advantage's proc rate to 100%.

I keep bringing it up, but can never get a response on it. People assume that Stim Boost w/Revitalizers heals for 20% of your life over 15 seconds: (15 seconds /(ticks every 3 seconds)) = 5 ticks 5 ticks * 4% health = 20% health But, Stim Boost's Revitalizer heal only heals 4 times, with the final tick not restoring health. So it's not a 20% heal, it's a bugged 16% heal. And, for some reason no one seems to care. Note: I've tested on both Operatives and Scoundrels, and they both have this bug.

Another thing I just thought of. They said this about Phase Walk: Perhaps Smuggle/Infiltrate should be mentioned in our PvE or Wildcard question as it's entirely unusable in PvE, and of questionable value in PvP. On the whole a good job framing the questions. Instead of asking specifically about certain abilities or problems, you're throwing at them all of our concerns and asking what's their plan for fixing them. An interesting tactic for sure.

I was going to add in that the +5 energy set bonus was acting more like +5% energy, shifting the tiers of energy regen as well as increasing max energy. But, after some cursory testing on my Scoundrel it seems this is no longer the case. Can someone else confirm this?

Over all I kinda like the idea although I disagree with something's which I shall comment on in red. 4. Did you mean Weakening Blast/Hemorrhaging Blast? If so, 15s is too long of a cooldown to be a viable source of TA/UH at range. Adding it to the modified Snipe/Charged Burst, with an ICD, would give you an option of how to acquire your TA/UH stacks at the current rate limit. 5. You wouldn't have to use Snipe/Charged Burst if you don't want to. That's the beauty of this change. You can still play Lethality/DF as a full melee spec and keep using Shiv/Blaster Whip to acquire your TA/UH stacks. 6. Explosive Probe/Sabotage might deal too much damage right now to allow it's use in a rotation with my suggested Fatality/Unfair Advantage talent. Just a gut feeling I have. 8. The goal was to get more abilities in the rotation besides the DoTs, TA/UH source, and Cull/Wounding Shots. We don't have an analigous ability to the Sniper/Gunslinger Takedown/Quickdraw ability. So, I attempted to create one from abilities we already have. 9. Nope, the number of Culls/Wounding Shots would be limited by TA/UH stacks and the use of Overload Shots/Quick Shots would be limited by energy. Thus negating a need for an ICD on this proc.

I'd argue that Lethality/DF plays like a ranged class that can dip into melee in PvP. So, why not build on that playstyle? There are three problems with improving survivability. First problem is that there are very few places to put it. The two DPS trees are jam packed with talents trying to compensate for a simple fact: We have one DPS ability that is never used and another that is used exceedingly rarely, because they do little to nothing for us. They need to work at least one of these abilities into the regular rotation of one of the specs to reduce the reliance on overloaded DPS talents. Heck on the PTS they decided to turn Stim Boost/Pugnacity into a talented defensive cooldown because of this bloat. The second second is that our existing defensive cooldowns suck vs the majority of classes and situations in the game. It looks good on paper giving each class 2 unique defensive cooldowns, but some are just odd. Like Force Shroud/Resilience and Dodge both remove Dots, but the former is better vs DoT classes because it prevents reapplication of DoTs for it's duration and because most of the player damage abilities in this game deal Force/Tech damage. The third problem, and it's really just the other side of the previous one, is that our defensive cooldown enhancing talents are either bad (Augmented Shields/Hotwired Defenses), in the wrong tree (Evasive Imperative/Scramble), or positioned poorly (Chem-Resistant Inlays/Scar Tissue). What Augmented Shields/Hotwired Defenses should do is provide some kind of secondary benefit instead of a flat boost. Like say a 50/100% chance when your Shield Probe/Defense Screen is broken to increase your damage reduction by 30% for the next 3-4 seconds. That way you have a defensive option to use when focused by multiple players. The ludicrous placement of Evasive Imperative/Scramble in Medicine/Sawbones always puzzled me. Healers shouldn't get straight defensive boosts, as their heals are their main defense. It should really be moved to Concealment/Scrapper where Pin Down/Stopping power is, and that talent should be rolled into the baseline ability. Then you could add a silly AoE heal talent for Carbine Burst/Blaster Volley, or something similar, in Evasive Imperative's/Scramble's place. Finally you have the placement of Chem-Resistant Inlays/Scar Tissue in Tier 2 of the Medicine/Sawbones tree. There's just not enough points to warrant going that deep into Medicine/Sawbones for either DPS tree. Swap it's position for Precision Instruments/Anatomy Lessons, and it would open up another survivability choice.

Made this post over in the Operative forum.

I replied to the 23/5 Operative Class Rep Questions thread when this idea popped into my head: What if they reworked Lethality/Dirty Fighting to a 15-20m mid-range spec? (I'm leaning toward 20m, but that could be too generous) Maybe that would fix some of the survivability issues with the spec. If you did it right, you wouldn't need to be in melee range to do damage. Here's how I would accomplish this: Redesign Operative's/Smuggler's low-level abilities so that they don't rely on cover. If Operatives/Scoundrels aren't going to use cover, the system shouldn't be present on their base class. Remove cover/crouch from Operatives/Scoundrels and their starting base classes. The new version of Snipe/Charged Burst would have a 15-20m range when used outside cover. (Snipers/Gunslingers would gain the old version when they picked their AC) Use of Snipe/Charged Burst on an Operative/Smuggler would generate one stack of Tactical Advantage/Upper Hand with an internal cooldown of 6 seconds shared with Shiv/Blaster Whip. Replace the Infiltrate cooldown reduction on Escape Plan/Smuggled Defense with a 100% pushback protection for Snipe/Charged Burst The new version of Explosive Probe/Sabotage would have a 15-20m range, slightly lower damage, and slightly lower energy cost for Scoundrels/Operatives and their starting base classes. (Snipers/Gunslingers would gain the old version when they picked their AC) Change Cull/Wounding Shots to have a 15-20m range. Change Fatality/Unfair Advantage so that Cull/Wounding Shots has a 100% chance to trigger Explosive Takedown, which finishes the cooldown Explosive Probe/Sabotage Charge and makes your next EP/SC cost no energy. Change License to Kill/Rough and Tumble to give Quick Shot a 100% chance to proc Locked and Loaded, which reduces the energy cost of your next two Culls/Wounding Shots by 5/10 energy and increases their crit chance by 3-6%. That's my crazy idea. Multiple new mechanics and usable abilities for Lethality/Dirty Fighting. Old playstyle remains relatively unchanged with a new mid-range style added in. Minimal impact on Sawbones and Concealment.

Hey maybe throw in a rhetorical question asking, "Why do we have cover-only abilities if we're not meant to be using cover?" This thought lead me to a Huge tangent that I've split to another more relevant post.

Operatives/Scoundrels will always be one of, if not the best PvE-solo DPS, and the best PvE/PvP Healer class. But it can never be the hands down best class at any else for DPS. Here's why: PvE No %Damage reduction or temporary Immunity abilities. This effects PvP, too. The lack of these abilities hurt in PvE, because of their use in dealing with random mechanics, and emergent gameplay. Say I'm doing NiM Brontes, and an orb spawns right before a phase transition. If I'm on almost any other DPS class, I have a way to run right to the orb activate my %DR or Immunity and detonate it. This is a specific example, but it's an example of a broader problem with not having these abilities in a PvE setting. This is being partly fixed in 2.8. Adding 20% DR to Stim Boost/Pugnacity via Revitalizers/Surprise Comeback. We'll have to see how it plays out, but it still leaves Lethality/Dirty Fighting flapping in the breeze. Gap closing + getting behind targets takes too long. This is mainly a problem for Concealment/Scrapper. This was lessened with the Exfiltrate/Scamper buff, but it's still an ever present concern. The first problem with our gap closer is that it only covers 24m, and requires two GCDs for full effect. The second problem is that not only do you have to get to your target, but you have to get behind your target. Which can be impossible to accomplish if you do anything to an add while gap closing it. So you're forced to sit on your hands while you're very likely the last melee DPS to get to a target. While we're not the worst in this regard. It is enough of an issue to get you benched if you're not superior in some other respect. Very little utility in PvE. What we have: Dirty Rez, 10m AoE Mez and 10m root (in Conc/Scrapper) What we don't have: %group damage reductions, group damage buffs, armor debuff, 30m root, taunt, push, pull, knockback or any type of short-term immunity (CC, Physics, Damage). PvP Healing is a great defensive utility for ranged classes, not so much for DPS Scoundrels. Although it can be very good under the right circumstances. The problem is that it's a losing proposition to stand and heal and you contribute very little as you attempt to run and heal. While it can contribute to survivability a good bit. Our healing is counted against us as defensive utility, when it's way more situational to use than the other two healing classes. Add to that no instant healing abilities, because they are locked up in Medicine/Sawbones. And you end up with melee DPS class that is forced to run and hide to heal, and can't last very long in a stand up fight. No %Damage reduction or temporary Immunity abilities. Sorcs/Sages are with us with lacking %DR cooldowns. Which is the main reason we do so well against them 1v1 in PvP. But they make up for it in other ways with their immunity bubble. This is being partly fixed in 2.8. Adding 20% DR to Stim Boost/Pugnacity via Revitalizers/Surprise Comeback. We'll have to see how it plays out, but it still leaves Lethality/Dirty Fighting flapping in the breeze. We're one of two melee classes that have no way to quickly gap close opponents or teammates on different levels, or abilities to bring them down to your level. Again, not the only class that suffers from this, Assassins/Shadows DPS are in the same boat unless they've preemptively placed their Phase Walk in the right place. There's probably a few other issues I've missed, but that's the main thrust of the problem. Until all these issues are addressed, and I'm not holding my breath, we will continue to be passed over for other classes in PvP and PvE for DPS roles.

Well I got rejected. Good luck to the rest of you!

I'm very interested. Thanks for the heads up Eric!

This is very unlikely due to the Lethality tree being shared with Snipers. Any merging of talents would affect them as well. Collaterally buffing Lethality Snipers might not be something they're looking to do. Your best talents to target for future changes would be talents that are linked to class specific Abilities. Specifically: Combat Stims Cut Down Escape Plan Quickening Fatality

Steps to reproduce: Scamper/Exfiltrate Another player times their knockback or pull so that you're still mid-air when Scamper would've finished. Alternate method (unable to reliably test): Player knocks you back or pulls you You're killed mid-air. (players at low health and being knocked into fire traps in Huttball seems to be the biggest trigger) In either case you're stuck until you are pulled, knocked back or leave the zone.

Wall-O-Text Incoming! In 2.7 I switched from Scoundrel to my Gunslinger for Progression Operations. This was a hard decision. As I love playing my Scoundrel (and my mirror Operative). My Scoundrel has been my main since Early Access. And, everything that I've unlocked in Collections is and will always be unlocked on my Scoundrel. That said Scoundrels have some pretty big drawbacks in PvE that I just couldn't ignore anymore. 1. Gap Closing sucks This was a more prominent concern prior to 2.7, but it's still relevant. Before 2.7 we had simultaneously one of the best and worst movement enhancing abilities in the game. Exfiltrate/Scamper was nigh unusable due to it's energy cost when you needed to use it, and almost game-breaking when you could afford to spam it. We also lack the ability, before and after 2.7, to effectively gap close opponents on different levels from us. (e.g. Opponents on the upper levels of the original Huttball Arena from the lower areas. With 2.7 came the new and improved Exfiltrate/Scamper. It had most of it's negatives removed: energy cost, distance reduction on slow, and the randomness of the talented upgrades to it. In fact, the upgraded Quickening/Scurry talent in Lethality/Dirty Fighting changes how I play that tree in most aspects of the game. Concealment/Scrapper got a little bit of a Faustian deal with it's talent upgrade to Shadow Operative Elite/Slippery Devil. These talents lost their 50% chance to cleanse otherwise un-cleansable DoTs (with a 15s cooldown mind you). Trading it for 50/50 odds of completely negating incoming Force/Tech attacks while rolling and 85/15 odds of dodging Ranged/Melee Attacks at the same time. All in all the changes made were unexpectedly insightful. The main sticking point after 2.7 for me was that it still requires 2 GCDs for less effect than a single Leap or Covered Escape/Hightail It. Which mainly affects Conc/Scrap spec. An acceptable solution would be to shift some of the distance from second roll into the first roll via a 20+ point deep Conc/Scrap talent. That way the same overall range covered doesn't change, and the need for the second roll is reduced in some situtations. All things considered, we are not worst class at gap closing. That honor is reserved for Powertech/Vanguard DPS. Though they make up for it in one respect, by having 100% knockback/knockdown/root/slow resistance while using Hydraulic Overrides/Hold the Line. And suffer to a lesser degree when facing opponents that are on different levels, as they can pull them to them in most cases. It still sucks more to try and gap close on them. tl;dr Exfiltrate/Scamper is good, but situationally can be bad. Also no way to quickly gap close opponents on different levels. 2. Melee are punished far too often It's hard to think of a boss fight in PvE where melee aren't punished for just trying to do their job. Mainly they are punished by taking more unavoidable AoE damage than Ranged DPS. Due in part to mechanics designed to thwart stacking of players in melee-range of the boss. They also suffer when rapidly swapping/chasing targets. Not to mention mechanics that require melee to run out and sit on their hands or those that knock them back. Overall it requires much more effort, for the same net effect, to play a melee DPS, than to play a ranged one. Again, we aren't the worst in this regard. But, we lack some of the tools other classes get passively to deal with these mechanics. In large part, I think, due to our ability to off-heal. 3. Lack of Emergent Gameplay and Group Utility This is a tough one, but we just lack many abilities that bring unique gameplay possibilities. And, the major one we do have: Disappearing Act/Revive (Dirty Rezzing) is practically impossible to achieve in most fights. We did get 50/50 invulnerability to Exfiltrate/Scamper in 2.7, but that's too much of a gamble for me. Whereas my Gunslinger potentially brings: Cover Pulse/Pulse Detonator 30m range Leg Shot root (especially good for Brontes) Entrench/Hunker Down protection from physics and stuns Covered Escape/Hightail It invulnerability while rolling (especially good for Brontes) Engineering/Saboteur Rollbanging Ballistic Shield/Scrambling Field for protecting your group members Just two days ago I saved a fellow DPS in NiM Grob'Thok who had aggro from an Ugnaught by rooting it, rolling to it, and knocking it back into the fire. Which is something you just can't do with many other classes. Operatives/Scoundrels, I feel, lack many the tools other classes have like: knockbacks, knockdowns, long range roots/mezzes, AoE stuns that don't break on damage, % damage mitigation abilities, instant gap closers like Force Leap, and physics/snares/CC protection abilities. While I personally would like to see some of these tools added Operatives/Scoundrels. I understand the need for balance among classes and creating a unique feel/playstyle for each one. So, I honestly have no idea where to start, but that's my reasoning behind switching. Edit: Oh and that damn facing requirement on Back Stab/Back Blast. If I've got aggro on something it's just too punishing, and screws everything up.

I just submitted my own post within 15 minutes of you posting this. Great minds think alike it seems. I've remove the text from my post, and added the relevant parts to this post. Back when the Class Representative program was started I created a few brainstorming posts for the Scoundrel Class rep. Here's my Scrapper (Concealment) post, and my Dirty Fighting (Lethality) post from the pre-2.5 days. We've seen a few patches since then, but a few concerns could still be valid. Also here's the Top 3 Questions/Answers they put out before suspending the Class Rep program (in order of release): Sniper // Gunslinger Sentinel // Marauder Sorcerer // Sage Vanguard // Powertechs Juggernaut // Guardian Scoundrel // Operative Mercenary // Commando And the one's they put out since resuming it (in order of release): Marauder // Sentinel Powertech // Vanguard Commando // Mercenary That's a little bit of heavy reading for sure. But, the questions players asked and the responses we received should be considered for any question we might ask. Here's my top 3 concerns/questions: Operatives (and Scoundrels) are one of two melee Advanced Class that doesn't have a 30% AoE reduction talent in any of our trees, and the only one that has no % damage reduction cooldown abilities. It almost feels like this is a holdover from the "engineered weaknesses" in certain specs, like the lack of interrupt on Mercenaries till 2.0. Can you inform us a little more about the design behind the active and passive Operative defensive abilities/talents, and share any changes we might look forward too? The facing requirement on Back Stab leaves you at a performance disadvantage in many PvE situations in Concealment spec. This was relaxed a little with the Jarring Strike change giving a small window of using Back Stab from any facing after using Hidden Strike. Any chance of re-purposing a talent into something similar to the Sorcerer's Wrath talent based around Shiv/Lacerate? (Where each use of the Shiv/Lacerate ability grants a stacking buff, which at 3-5 stacks removes the Facing requirement from Back Stab) Revitalizers was collaterally nerfed in 2.0 with the change to Stim Boost. It went from a constant 2% heal every 3 seconds as long as you maintained Stim Boost, to a 16% heal (The fifth tick is bugged and doesn't heal) on a 2 minute cooldown. Can we have the pre-2.0 functionality and healing percentage of Revitalizers back only changed to heal if you have any Tactical Advantage stacks instead?