This video is doing the opposite of what you want. Do you think the devs are stupid? They can see in this video an operative "owning" low level players: The levels of players taken down are: 12, 27, 42, 19, 43, then a 50 who charges into 7 people ahead of his teammates; then level 27, then a 50 who trinkets and OH LOOK almost kills the Operative, forcing him to blow a cooldown to run away. Then it's back to lowbies: levels 26, 44, 31, 18, 35, level 50 that gets the full brunt of the OP's opening rotation, and only takes 50% of his life in damage HOW WEIRD! Then a level 46, and level 19 player gets "owned" in two seconds, which Sorc or Merc can do as well. Then a level 50 who was already at 1/3rd life, then a level 50 2v1, a 46 with half life... Can you see the problem here? It's all lowbies, people outnumbered, or teamwork that wins, not the Operative alone on even ground against a similarly geared, skilled, and supported opponent. Your theory has holes, sir. When there is a 50-only bracket (matter of weeks) people will see that burst has problems against ANY team with a smidgen of teamwork and/or healing. Also, most underplayed class in the game, and you are crying about it. What does that tell you about your PvP ability?

Bounty Hunters and Sorcerers both level faster than operatives before they get Hidden Strike. Which is at level 36. They probably level faster after that as well. Enjoy your FOTM switch, you probably won't play him past 20.

We have strong heals that don't require us to stand and cast. We have a CC from stealth (sleep dart). We have a stun. We have an AoE 8 second CC. We have escapes, defensive abilities, and also some strong cast-time heals. What else do you want exactly?

You seem oblivious to the point. Anyway, good music, bad PvP. Don't post videos of you not taking PvP seriously and expect anything but derisive responses.

This sounds about right. It can be very high dps in PvP, but it takes a bunch of global cooldowns to get your rotation set up for two high damage Culls. In the fluidity of PvP it's overly difficult compared to the burst, up front damage of Concealment. It's good for Snipers in PvP, but more PvE for Operatives in my opinion. You still do a ton of damage in PvP with it, but being primarily dot focused, it will piss people off when they try to CC. In PvP, CC > AOE 7 DoT damage unless you are against inexperienced players. TL;DR: Concealment is better for PvP, Lethality is too clunky and breaks CCs, pissing off teammates.

You acting like you are amazing is only going to lead to bad things in this thread. Here are the facts: 1. You will get people calling for nerfs to Concealment, because all they see is a clicker/keyboard turner killing people before they can get up from the Hidden Strike opening knockdown. 2. Those people nerf-calling aren't going to see that the characters you killed that fast were: level 21, level 11, level 43, level 18, against you and a partner, or inexperienced level 50's with 13k hps (freshly 50). 3. I call them inexperienced level 50's, because they fall for your only strategy (in your own words) of doing enough damage to make them panic. Against anyone with experience, or a teammate, you can't pull it off. 4. This, and threads like it, have a chance to get the spec unnecessarily nerfed. 5. I play a Medic operative in PvP, so it makes little difference to me, but please respect the Operative forums if you don't want to be mocked.

Exactly. People see what they want to see.

Medals give you additional rewards I believe - 1 commendation per medal, I think. I'm not 100% sure on that. People stand in acid and heal themselves for more medals because they are idiots. The valor rank is for top level PvP gear - some stuff requires X valor rank to wear. There are many resources out there already with a bunch of information on PvP. I recommend starting with: http://guard-this.com/2011/12/24/pvp-gear-guide/

Highest I've heard is 600kish by a medic op in PvP. He did say he averaged 150k-400k usually, but rolls with some buddies, one of which can guard him. I do too, it helps enormously to stay alive, until they get excited and leap to someone across the map to kill them

Several PvP healing Operatives swear by the spec, so it must. I am not high enough to have the full spec yet, so I'm only 95% sure, as I haven't asked them to provide proof or anything.

Only thing I haven't done there is use a blaster rifle rather than a blaster pistol. The stats between them seem negligible. Also, the problem is not aggro - she is extremely squishy and either dies on every pull, or goes to 25%. I have to spend time healing her half the fight, and she doesn't do much damage on her own. So I might as well use Vector, and expect to heal. He takes down enemies much faster, so it works better. I think Kaliyo is just a weak companion, and that's fine since we get more than one.

Yep, had my Armormech buddy make her as much blue and green defense gear as possible, and going to the GTN for the rest. It didn't make much difference. Perhaps closer to 50 when gear with defensive stats really starts kicking in, but not at 35. Vector just seems better.

Mobs are often on me when I have Vector, but that's fine because I tank better than Kaliyo =-o I don't know, maybe my Kaliyo is bugged, but Vector has been a far better experience taking on same-level enemies.

You are essentially saying I shouldn't compare a good solo-er to a poor solo-er? Why not? The point of a comparison is to show the difference between two things. There is quite a difference, in this case. It seems to just be that Agents are late bloomers, so to speak. They need to give Agents Hidden Strike much sooner in my opinion. Or a better tank in Kaliyo =) Regardless, the Agent is definitely more fun soloing with Vector as dps, and me as healing.

Quick update: Solo'd a level 36 Jedi Champion with 53k hps with Vector tanking. Took 3 minutes or so, but no problem at all. He tanks better than Kaliyo for sure. Poor Kaliyo, tries so hard...

Answered my own question: Vector in level 33 greens is tougher than Kaliyo in 33 blues, and hits much harder. Even on same level elite pulls, or multiple silvers, I just heal through any tough parts, and help dps the rest. Feels much faster so far ( currently level 36 on Quesh).

/sadface

-Kaliyo feels like a paper tank. -Loken's Rakghoul form seems to have only two dps abiltities, making him only effective as a healer, and I want to level healer since my group of friends needs me to fill that role. -Vector does good dps but dies very, very fast. -Ship droid needs to be shot in the face, since he says, "Excellent, I was just wondering what I could do to please you" about 5 times a minute (not a joke, try using him sometime, ugg). As healing spec, I feel relegated to Kaliyo. Even keeping her in blues every 3 levels, she still needs a ton of healing, and for me to do the majority of the dps. Am I doing it wrong? Is concealment/Lokenheals the only way to go without being annoyed to death? Mostly this stems from friends playing bounty hunters with Mako just tearing through packs of mobs without ever stopping to recuperate...

Depends what you want to do. It seems in the specs you linked, you want to use Kolto probe to proc more Tac Advantage, and use it for dps (Lacerate or Cull). That will probably get you around 130k healing and damage done in an average match, some more with optimal 50 gear. If you focus on healing, and use this spec, you will probably two or three times the healing, but much less dps: http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#401rffMzhoozZZGbrkM0h.1 Couple points are moveable depending on preference, but it seems to be the PvP healing-centric spec for Operatives. It focuses on using your HoT, and a little bit of poison DoTs. You can also forgo the damage entirely and just enjoy the high crit chance on your Kolto Probe (35-50% if the numbers hold up at 50). So decide what you want to do - healing, dps, or hybrid healing/dps. It seems the most healing/dps will come from over time tech abilities, so your burst will likely not be amazing unless you go all-out Concealment. I learned that from lethality - felt like I couldn't really kill people fast, but at the end of matches I'd have top 3 damage every time, much to my surprise.

They seem to give 1 Bonus Healing for every 5.89 Power or Tech Power (according to my Bonus Healing stat on my Character sheet in game). What is the point of the Biochem "Triage Adrenal" which gives 565 Tech/Force Power and reducing damage dealt by 50% - when you can just make an "Attack Adrenal" for the same 565 Power (which gives the same Bonus Healing), with no downside to damage dealt? What am I missing?

Clearly you aren't the absolutely best and most intelligent player ever to play a concealment operative. Many people have beaten the Act I boss event as concealment, including me, or we'd have a forum full of complainers. To the OP, concealment works fine, lethality is awkward but can work, and medicine is strong. As medicine, use Kaliyo to tank, throw heals on her, when Tactical Advantage procs, use it on Carbine Burst for aoe. Groups of non silver/golds are fast. Groups with Silvers/Golds take longer, but you are almost never in any danger of failing. Slam them with Backstab, Shiv, and Rifle Shot as you heal Kaliyo, and enjoy the fact that you have no downtime between fights. Personally, I've found I hate having to recuperate after each pull, so I'm enjoying Medicine more lately. DPS specs are like sprinting, and having to pause to rest almost every group. Medicine spec is slow and steady and can win the race. Just depends what you want to do outside soloing, IMO. I still haven't made up my mind, thank goodness finishing Act I seems to reset my skill tree respec costs, or I'd be broke by now.

There are several good threads on people's preferences. One exciting thing that keeps me truckin' on my Jugg is the fact that there are several "hybrid" specs that are great for PvP endgame. They both are geared towards not being "squishy", which means figuring out how to do decent damage in PvP while in our defensive Soresu stance. One really good resource by a guy who's been testing this very idea is called Guard This: http://guard-this.com/ The guy is known as MonkeyGenius, in game as Nyan. He's finally getting into testing specs for PvE damage as a Juggernaut, but scroll down and you will find some good info about PvP, including videos detailing what the play-style is capable of. You can also check out a new series of videos by a guy called Grievv from TORFiend, who takes MonkeyGenius's ideas and makes his own path (swath?) through PvP: http://www.youtube.com/user/TORFiend Both worth your time to check out. You could go full dps spec, gear, and stance in PvP, but you will die alot. Going hybrid (or dps spec/gear and defensive stance), the whole idea is to be tough, do decent damage, and be full of useful utility things that help turn the tide in whatever war zone you are in. That's what interests me in PvP.

If you are roleplaying, using phrases like, "In this video and the videos to come" really kills the immersion, ruining the whole thing.

I'm guessing they just moved the 5-day release schedule up 2 days, so that those coming in on the 5th day wouldn't get in on Monday, which would be pointless for most people. If they stick to 5 days, starting 2 days early, the last peeps would get by Saturday around 1:30pm, with most the weekend still to play.

That graph has the earliest invites in 7/11, and then pulls back to 6/11 pre-orders? Sounds like someone with too much time on their hands