My guild runs with 2 sorc healers as well. We also run with 2 dps mercs however. Just make sure everyone is spread out so it minimizes the number of affected players, and the mercs have to pitch in to cleanse it. It's not really all that bad, since the dps check at that fight is quite minimal.

Going from a 28 mainhand hilt to a 31 will be a fairly substantial, noticeable increase.

It's been working this way for a while. Lots of people have been stacking the Arkanian & Underworld SA relics and they don't share a proc lockout. (2 arkanian or 2 underworld DO share a lockout however.) Based on that, until they fix it (if it's not intended) I have to imagine that the BiS Relics for most healers/dps is going to be an Underworld SA and a Dread Forged SA.

We were stumbling through this last night also. I'm not sure how long the other phases took you, so it COULD be an "enrage/reset" mechanic... we did see him reset once, the first time we got to the last phase and THOUGHT there were supposed to get two of the pyramids to put on the tables, but couldn't find a pyramid. SO there is a timer for reset, just not sure if it's limited to the final phase, or if it's cumulative from the start of the encounter. What we did in the last phase: Send 7 players into the yellow portal, and 1 player (an assassin tank) into the blue portal. The tank ran to pick up the Pyramid, and used Force Speed to get back to the portal (you take a nasty DoT while you hold the pyramid)... once out of the blue portal, one of the healers on the yellow side would exit and heal the tank while he placed the pyramid on either the left or the right table. (You have to coordinate between teams... if you place the pyramid on the left table, a yellow circle will appear on the ground, on the left side in the yellow-side-portal that if the boss is standing in it will drop the immunity. It only lasts a short time however, so you have to very quickly send someone back into the blue portal to grab the pyramid, because when the bosses immunity comes back, the pyramid will respawn and you have to rinse/repeat. We had a couple pug dps with us, so our dps wasn't all that great, but we did down him in 3 cycles of the Pyramid. I imagine a Sorc healer could quite easily handle the pyramid duty, with force speed and the ability to self heal.

I have an external hard drive that I keep a copy of the game on. You could probably even do it with a large enough thumbdrive.

Yeah, i took a look at them last night for my assassin tank... If i were to spend a ton of coms and buy 78 gear, I would be an endurance-heavy/mitigation light tank, and that is bad. So, I stuck with my Underworld min/max'd 72s.

That raises the question then.... "Why does a casual NEED high-end mods?" Think about it. Why does a player NEED high end gear? Well, they need it to clear high-end content. And casual players quite frankly, don't clear high-end content. What is the point of progression raiding, or beating the highest-high-end content, if the same rewards for it can be obtained by throwing credits at the GTN? (I currently feel the same way about the fact that the loot drops in NiM TfB/S&V are lower than the drops from HM DF/DP, that is just silly.) If a casual player just HAS to have high-end gear, but can't clear the content necessary to obtain it, shouldn't he pay a premium to have access to the rewards for content he is incapable of clearing? No. Just, No.

I wholeheartedly disagree. Crafting operations gear, should be tied to operations. Think about Molecular Stabilizers..... The biggest problem I'd had with crafting recently, was the fact that crafting top-end raiding gear, required mats from running Dailies. That is silly. Don't know what the point of crafting right now is anyway... Since 75 & 78 exist, but both are uncraftable. Why would anyone spend money to get 72s?

The bigger problem you have, is that crafting 31 gear still requires Isotope5s, except the only place to get them now, is in Toborro's Courtyard.

Gratz on the kill and world first!

^ 100% this. I take this approach to a good many things with my kids though. For example, fairly recently, my brother-in-law got married. I was torn over whether or not to take them to the wedding/reception, because they were going to be the only children there. They love their uncle to pieces tho, so I decided to take them. After the wedding, I took them into the reception, and let them dance with the adults for a bit. The people there thought the kids were awesome, and danced with them for a few songs....... But, after about 30 minutes? I packed them up, said the goodbyes, and took them home (leaving my wife at the party). At which point, the normal raucousness that occurs when a bunch of 20-30-somethings have a bit to drink and start having a good time, commenced. It would have been unrealistic and unfair of ME, to expect every other adult at the wedding, to alter what THEY were doing, to accommodate my kids. I think people need to take this same approach to kids and gaming. I don't expect the people I play with, to change what THEY are doing, for the sake of my kids. (Hence why I turn off chat, and don't let them on voice.) I change what I am doing to accommodate the kids, because is my job as their parent. And personally speaking? I didn't choose to limit [FLIRT] and romance conversation options with my kids because of SGR. I limit it, because romance in general is a more mature concept that I'm not completely ready to discuss with my kids yet. I would never expect the GAME/DEVS to cater to my own personal desires/beliefs/whatever, because I am the one CHOOSING to bring my kids along for the ride. Anyone who does that, has bigger issues than a video game.

I recognize that there is a hint of hypocrisy in this on my part. I just made a determination, that the fantasy/stylized violence of force lightning/lightsabers was less invasive to the innocence of my kids, than romance/sexuality. I could be right, I could be wrong. It's the decision I made though.

I am a pretty open-minded, forward-thinking parent... But you sir, have me beat.

This is a personal choice for me as a parent. I wouldn't say that if another parent chose to operate differently, that they were wrong. This was just a line I chose to draw. This may make me sound super old-fashioned, but quite frankly, I really want my kids to retain that part of their childlike innocence for as long as possible. Girls have cooties still, and that's OK. My 7yr old hides his eyes whenever he sees anyone kissing, including turning a corner and finding my wife and I kissing in the kitchen. It's cute, and I don't want him to lose that just yet. I'm not saying I'm one of those parents that's never going to address the subject with my kids... I think that those kinds of conversations need to happen at home between parents/children... It's just not a bridge I'm ready to cross with any of my kids just yet, and I'll do whatever I can do to prolong it. FWIW - They all still believe in Santa, although I am fairly certain this is either the last year for my 9yr old, or he's figured it out by now... but it was a good run. I'm not saying I am right or wrong, it was just a choice that I made.

I think for me anyway... its about having a shared interest with my kids. I love baseball... my boys and I go to baseball games, and play sandlot ball at our local field. I love the woods and hiking... my boys and I explore the woods behind my house. If I was an avid fisherman? I would take them fishing with me. If I was a football fan? I would take them to games. I am a Star Wars fan... we watch the movies together, and until it went off-air? Every weekend we piled up on the couch to watch the new episodes of Clone Wars together. It works both ways too... They love bike riding.... So I bought a bike and I ride with them. They love cards and action figures... So we play together. I can also host a pretty spectacular "Tea Party" with my 2yr old daughter, and I can wear pretend makeup with the best of them. So, the boys know I play SWTOR, and they know I enjoy it, and they want to be a part of it. It's not like I have a weekend hangout at the corner bar, and I'm choosing to bring my kids along so they can "be like dad".... We're talking about a video game, of an IP they love. As long as I can be there to guide them with it, I think it's generally a good bonding experience for us. The other interesting thing here... I also have a 5yr old son. He does NOT play, although he is VERY jealous of his brothers, he's been told that he's just too young. Quite frankly, I think my 7yr old is right on the edge. If he was the oldest? I probably wouldn't have him playing. But, because he and my 9yr old are INCREDIBLY competitive, it would cause major issues.... ones I am not willing to deal with.

I'm not quite ready to expose my kids to the community aspect quite honestly. I know that my guild would be receptive of it, within reason. I can't expect them to keep voice chat PG at say, 10pm at night. On the flipside, if I were online with my 7/9 yr olds at that hour, I don't think it's my guildies that are the ones that have a problem. General chat/pop can be hit or miss, and I have no control over it, so I choose to block it from them entirely. HONESTLY tho, none of those are the reasons that I keep the community aspect away from my kids..... The #1 reason, is that at the ages they are at, they are really just learning how to form relationships and friendships with other kids their own age, learning how to conflict resolve and generally interact. I think that introducing an online aspect to that otherwise newly developing ability, would do them more harm than good. That may change as I see them get older, but for right now, I'm not really willing to bend on it.

One word: Boundaries. Around that age, I got my first console. The original NES. I loved that thing and would have played it 24/7. Except my parents put boundaries on it. I had time limitations. At no time, could I play more than an hour a day, and the only way I got my 1 hour gametime, was through "buying it" by doing an equal amount of reading. Furthermore? If it was a nice sunny summer day, and all the neighborhood kids were outside playing? No amount of reading to "buy" video game time, was going to convince my parents to let me stay inside and play video games. My kids and I play, for roughly an hour a night, after dinner when their homework is done. I usually get 2 nights per week, with each of them. I wouldn't qualify 2hrs week, as lobotomizing themselves. Each parent has the right (and in my mind, the OBLIGATION) to establish this sort of thing for themselves with their kids. I don't think it's fair to restrict them to ZERO gametime, but it's unhealthy to let it be entirely unregulated also.

Point taken. However, I was around that age, somewhere around 7ish when I saw the original Star Wars trilogy with my dad. There are hands being cutoff, people being elaborately tortured, eaten by Rancors, more torture with Force Lightning.... I somehow grew up to become a well-adjusted adult who's never committed a felony because of sci-fi violence. Bring into the mix the new trilogy? More hands being cut off, more force lightning torture, Anakin even decapitates Count Dooku. My kids and I, and my wife have all watched the Star Wars films together, and my kids are big fans, because.. well... it's Star Wars and it's awesome. There's nothing that I have seen in the game, that's any more or less violent than the movies. My point is, there's a healthy place for kids to recognize the difference between actual violence, and fantasy/make believe. In the real world, violence is an actual, real grotesque thing that is tossed into their laps everyday when they have drills at school to practice what to do if there is a shooting, or just like this past year in our district when a young girl was kidnapped and murdered by her middle school friends. That is real life, and it's things that my 7/9yr olds have to live with, and as a parent I have to help them deal with it. On the flip side, they DO understand the difference between REAL and MAKE BELIEVE, maybe because my wife and I have helped them to understand it. I'm not in any way saying that I am ready to put them at a controller to play GTA or Call of Duty, because I think games like that DO potentially blur the Fantasy/Reality lines in the mind of a child. But as a highly stylized character with a lightsaber? Or lightning flying from your fingertips? IMHO it's less of an issue.

I've recently started playing SWTOR with my kids. (7 and 9) I recognize that some of the content is a bit mature, and chat content is entirely unpoliced, so I do approach it with an air of parental caution. Hence, they have a few rules: 1- Neither of them are allowed to play without me. 2- When I play with them, I have all of their chat turned off. 3- I monitor/guide their conversation choices at times, at least when [FLIRT] options are involved. 4- They NEVER get on voice servers. I let them each choose the class they wanted to play, and as fate would have it, they BOTH chose to play an Assassin. (I guess to a kid, the coolness factor of Darth Maul outweighs everything else?) Which kind of sucks for me, since I've already played an Assassin to 55, seen the story... and now, when I play with my kids, I get to see it TWO more times lol. Anyway.... most of the time, we play just the two of us, doing story and planet content, with the occasional heroics that we are capable of 2-manning. Since they each play characters that are on my wife's account, we really can't all 3 of us play together at once, I guess I could have set them up with F2P accounts, but I wanted to keep it a little simpler, and they have access to anything that my wife has in her Collections and Legacy, which makes things nicer. We are currently around lvl 17/18 about to finish of Dromund Kaas. (I am playing a Jugg Tank with my 7yr old opposite his Assassin DPS, and a Sorc DPS opposite my 9yr old's Assassin tank.) Which brings me to..... Group Finder. And I'd like some opinions from either players who don't have kids and think they have no place in this game (a perfectly valid opinion) and people with kids who either let them play, or don't let them play. This weekend, I got in-game with my 9yr old. (he on his assassin tank, and me on my sorc dps) and we entered the Group Finder queue for Hammer Station. It was an instant pop, since he's a tank, and we started the flashpoint. Remember, he has no chat turned on, although I do, so I can communicate with the other 2 random members. I gave my son instructions on what to do, explained target of target to him, and a general description of how threat/aggro works, and what a guard does, and then told him that his challenge was to guard the other dps, and then try to hold my aggro without using his taunt. And you know what? He did great! I only ripped from him a few times, and it was only on trash, never on a boss. (and yes, I do know what I am doing lol) He paid attention to his target of target, made sure he was always holding aggro, I talked him through how to limit his AoE when we were in pulls that we were using CC on. He even tanked the last boss like a champ. At the end of the flashpoint, no wipes, everyone was happy and the other 2 people were doing the quintessential "thanks for the group" in chat, I actually typed "Good group, and btw... your tank today was a 9yr old kid." And they were shocked. Now, I don't know if this will remain the case as the content starts to get a bit harder, but he'll have time to learn while leveling before getting there. (I also did Hammer Station in the GF with my 7yr old on his Assassin DPS, and he only derp'd once using Overload on a CC'd pull, but I explained to him why not to do that, and he never did it again.) My point here is....... Typically, when I get into groups and I found out that members of the group are kids.. (13 and under) my initial response is typically "*** this is going to be a wipefest"... but now that the shoe is on the other foot, and I'm watching how well my very young kids are handling things? Maybe I've been a bit of a crotchedy old man. Just wondering what other people's thoughts are on this.... Positive, Negative, indifferent.

No what's not? You lack a bit of depth in your response, which would enable the reader to have any sort of idea what it is exactly that you are intending to convey. If you are hinting that when you are doing Flashpoints, that you are "getting all damage teams" then chances are pretty good that you are queueing for the role-neutral Czerka flashpoints? Or are you talking about people queueing as tanks/healers that are actually DPS? .......

<--- Ocho-Quatro My real-initials are "AD4" - say it fast... A DEE FOUR - eighty four - 84 - ocho-quatro.

I really appreciate all of your advice and help. I'm really loving playing this class, even though I've only been 55 for less than a week I'll be pulling my first HM S&V as an operative healer this week, and I'm feeling fairly confident in my abilities thanks to a lot of your advice. I've been playing with gear, and added some upgrades also (like my 72 offhand, and some Artful Mod 31s) and also have been able to get my alacrity a lot closer to 450, and one more upgrade SHOULD get me just about there. (sacrificed a little surge to do it, but it seems the benefits of alacrity > surge are worthwhile.) And for what it's worth, there was a fairly noticeable difference in crit frequency going from 24.5/25% crit that I had before, up to what I have now. The Power sacrifice was well worth it. Also, breaking 900k-1M heals in PvP now as a result of all my gear changes/etc... and I am still using PvE gear in PvP because I am waiting for 2.4 to drop to spend my coms (capped ranked and regular) because I can use them for most of a full set of Conqueror instead of Partisan.... so that will help also, since I'll cap expertise. Current stats: STATS: Cunning: 3,287 Endurance: 2,841 Power: 923 Alacrity: 441 Crit: 252 Surge: 292 RANGED: Damage (Pri) 1,440 - 1691 Bonus Damage: 937 Critical Chance: 27.68% Critical Multiplier: 67.76% TECH Bonus Damage: 1,399 Bonus Healing: 1,007 Critical Chance: 27.30% Critical Multiplier: 67.76% Activation Speed: 7.86%

SM TfB/S&V can be cleared in 61/63s.... HM 55 FPs are completely doable in BLUE 66s, which are actually below purple 63s. The OP is not undergeared for HM FPs. That said, 1600 dps is "low" compared to what other better-geared 55s will be pushing, HOWEVER, in your gear, that's doing OK. You should be fine for HM FPs, and I wouldn't beat yourself up over it.

My imperial guild was stuck at Styrak for about 2 weeks when we were progressing Hard Mode, so this is one fight that I know (unfortunately) very well... So some things to note: (Having all your dps at least with adrenals really helps this fight FYI) 1- Hard enrage is at 8 minutes, and the clock starts when the first Kell Dragon jumps down from the throne. 2- If you haven't killed the Kell Dragon within around 120s (2 minutes), beating enrage is going to be very difficult. (If you have a tank-choking add up with anywhere near 100k left on the Dragon, ignore it and kill the dragon to avoid another spines phase.) 3- The Kell Dragon takes 10% damage while in "Spines" phase, so don't blow any big dps/long cooldowns while he is spinning. 4- After the Kell Dragon is dead, presumably you have 6-ish minutes left on your enrage timer. When Styrak appears the first time, this is the longest uninterrupted dps window you will have on him, so pour that the damage on.... healers can help here too, since there isn't a lot of damage. 5- The first Chained Manifestation is the roughest, since it's timed badly with the Nightmare Manifestation, so you will most likely be short 1 dps, so the healers and tanks really have to push it for the first one. 6- Lightning Manifestation - It helped us to assign locations to 4 players. (1 Tank North, 1 Tank South, 1 DPS East, 1 DPS West) - The healers and 2 ranged DPS would stay in the middle. One of the ranged in the middle would target the North add and the other targets the South add. They get burned fast, then switch to the East/West to polish them off fast. (If you take too long, someone is going to get one-shotted, so they all have to die fast.) 7- Push the most dps you can on Styrak whenever he is out. Every little bit counts. Total Damage Dealt in this fight is meaningless, it's all about EFFICIENT DAMAGE on Kell Dragon -> Styrak -> Rez'd Kell Dragon -> Styrak. 8- Rinse/Repeat until Styrak hits 15%. This HAS to occur BEFORE he starts the 5th Nightmare/Chained cycle. If you hit a 5th cycle, you WILL enrage around the same time as he revives the Kell Dragon, and you WILL die. 9- At 15% Styrak will revive the Kell Dragon right where is standing. The whole group needs to move back towards the cave entrance (not all the way back, just enough to put some space between the dragon and Styrak). The tank will pull the dragon away from Styrak, BECAUSE if your AoE's hit Styrak during this phase, you take damage and will die. ALSO - the Kell Dragon has a buff that he deals more damage from range, so everyone should be stacked and the healers drop puddles/aoe heals. The 2nd Dragon has no frontal/cleave, but does deal a bit of damage. However, he also takes roughly double-damage so burning him shouldn't take too long. (Tanks need to swap aggro during this phase, because they will take a stacking debuff that will melt them pretty quickly if they don't swap.) 10- Once the revived Kell Dragon is dead, the entire team needs to stack under the ledge by the cave entrance where you came in, and the tanks tank-swap every time Styrak switches targets. (not unlike the Furious Tantrum phase at The Terror, only you are also dealing with stuns.) If you've done it right, and met all your time markers, if Styrak enrages at all, it should be sub-5% and he is fairly easy to burn at that point. If you are consistently seeing your DPS break the 1.1 to 1.2M damage dealt mark, it means you are taking too long, and the dps isn't high enough. The cleanest my guild has done this fight, was enrage at 2%, and only one of our dps had above 1M total damage dealt. You really should be seeing all 4 of your dps in the 900-950k range, assuming your tanks aren't pushing really low numbers, and the healers are pitching in. Hope this helps! Our guild went from being completely unable to clear him at all, to one-shotting him, just by tightening everything up, and one person in the raid calls out all mechanics, when to use adrenals, relics and dps damage buff cooldowns. Now it's pretty trivial.

This isn't entirely true. There is a common misconception on how Taunt works with regard to the threat table. Tanks who open with taunt, should stop tanking. (Let's just say that upfront) A taunt does exactly TWO things: (in PvE) 1- It guarantees that the taunted mob will not target anyone else for 6 seconds. 2- It puts the person who taunted, at the top of the current threat table @ 110%*** of the person with top threat. *** No. 2 is VERY important... because threat operates at two different threat levels to pull aggro. (see below, it's not always 110%) Melee & Ranged Characters in "melee" range need to pull 110% of the threat of the person at the top of the table to pull aggro. So for the sake of argument, let's assume that the tank currently has 100,000 Threat, and the marauder attacking the same target has generated 105,000 Threat. Even tho, the marauder is technically at the top of the threat table, he will not pull aggro until he hits 110,000 Threat, because he needs 110% threat to pull aggro. Characters from "range" need to pull 130% of the threat of the person at the top of the table to pull aggro. So for the sake of argument, let's assume that the tank currently has 100,000 Threat, and the sniper attacking the same target has generated 115,000 Threat. Even tho, the sniper is technically at the top of the threat table, (by more than 110% even) he will not pull aggro until he hits 130,000 Threat, because he needs 130% threat to pull aggro. So what does that mean? Well, to answer that question you have to define what "Melee" and "Range" are. And it's been determined (by people smarter than me who put in more time looking at this) that: Melee = 4m or LESS from the center of the target. Range = MORE than 4m from the center of the target. So, correlating back to the 2 things that Taunt does, and how important #2 is.... If you are tanking, and you are 3m from the boss and you TAUNT, you will get put at the top of the threat table + 10%. BUT If you step backwards to 4.1m and then TAUNT, you will get put at the top of the threat table +30%. Basically at the end of the day, what that means is that if you back up a few steps before taunting (for threat, not mechanics) you SHOULD stay well ahead of the dps's threat because your taunts are generating 20% more threat then if you taunted from within "melee" range. After cycling a few 130% taunts in a fight that doesn't have a threat-dump-mechanic or tank swapping? In theory, you SHOULD be so far ahead in the table that it would take incredibly stellar DPS to pull off you. I'd have to dig around to find the proof for this, but it does work this way in-game.