I'd like to clear some things up: -you need to be a subscriber to actually play the game. This is more like WoWs free trial than anything, eventually players need to become a subscriber or they can't continue. -everyone is upset because the F2P model has been the focus instead of releasing actual content. -with the current announcement of the August patch, there was no mention of new flashpoints and only 1 operation! As far as I'm concerned this game is done. The only thing that has been the same issue for months now, is the lack of content. Personally I'll be sticking around for that release but if it drops with only 1 op I won't be leveling to 55 and quitting. I'm bored with the game and I've been 50 for 4 weeks now! That's absurd.

This is called a Mechanics check. It is the first time players are introduced to "you're going to keep failing until you realize the boss has things you need to learn to control." This fight is extremely easy and I explain it to every tank and dps when I come to it on my alt healer. Mind you I have NO birthright gear or hand me downs. 1) tank goes left group goes right. The boss almost always starts with a cone AOE. 2) tank against wall, never move. 3) dps and healer avoid AoE. 4) Dps kill adds. 5) Healer heals. It's really simple actually, and even in groups I thought the tank was brain dead - they listen. In fact every time I explain the fight we 1 shot it and whenever I don't we fail... So now I always explain the fight

The tank just needs to deal with it tbh. I do every time and while it's annoying it is very crucial in Hm, in sm I tank back against wall because it's a non-issue

I didn't read every post but I can say this- Had I read the reviews on this game before buying it... well I wouldn't have and instead I would have gone back to WoW after not playing it for 2 years; or possibly a different MMO. That said, I'm very glad I never read the comments about the game because after clearing most of the content there is right now I can confidently say this is a strong release. The devs admitted they did not anticipate the ability of players to mow through content and that this playerbase has the stronges engagement of any game they've ever launched. That is a success. The issues in this game are so minor it makes me laugh when I see people crying over certain issues. More content is on its way, but if you've been playing since day 1 I beyond understand your issue. Stop playing then. I don't know why people feel the need to only play 1 game all the time. Variety is the spice of life after all. I see this game being a powerhouse in 1-2 years from now as development continues to take their playerbase into consideration. They tackle issues very efficiently (although it is very frustrating that they aren't open in the era of social media and media saturation / transparency). I've enjoyed the game so far and came in at the perfect time IMO. I hit 50, am nearly BiS, and will be facing new content in the coming months. Just enough time to level an alt and get them geared.

I have no recordings to offer but I can't give you opinions xD. When I run with 3-4 classes drops tend to be a little biased towards certain classes, but still completely random. When I run with 2 classes it is much more likely to be extremes, in fact I find I often have worse luck because of the "flip a coin" issue. When you flip a coin it is highly possible that in the first 10 flips you won't see a single heads. In fact try it right now! It is a 50 / 50 shot but the actual chance is 50 / 50 only over time. I'm trying to explain this and I have very little background in the math needed so sorry if I sound like an idoit lol because I am. Basically what I'm saying is that in a normal flashpoint it is highly likely to not get anything you actually need. As far as LFG, that isn't actually random. If you're set to random, and I'm set to Esseles and we get matched; guess where you're going. I always get the same places when I que up because of people that need gear that are specifically farming, I've made it a point to ask because it's happened so much lol. Hope this helped a bit with your thoughts.

TL;DR at bottom. Here is the issue with trash - too much cc. In WoW I was able to pull 6-8 groups at once knowing that since I heavily out geared the heroic my healer and I could handle it. Eventually there were pockets of enemies you had I pull 1 group at a time but that was ok. Everything was very close together an within reason the pacing was good. Developers in this game really love making every enemy 15-20 yards apart, half the time I can't even AoE more than 2-3 mobs! The issue isn't too much trash, it's too much distance. Don't even mention how I get thrown around constantly! Tanks need some kind of anti CC aura because as it stands I get thrown around the room constantly. I get pushe back, pulled in, stunned, slowed, Agro drops, Agro targets, there isn't an end! I can't speed tank with the current set up of mobs, it's miserable. Sometimes I can, and we breeze through, chaining pulls and never stopping. This is rare though as only certain flashpoints let you chain pull. Not to mention because of this vast amount of cc the healer is constantly cleansing what they can and burning resources -_- then you have to wait for them! Imagine removing a lot of the space they give us, Taral V has an INSANE level of distance between each boss. So much that you ride a speeder to make it faster! This is one thing WoW did well (I can only speak about TBC), ther were mostly short instances - I'd say 80% and about 20% long instances with lots of trash. This made the long ones feel more epic. There aren't any throw away flashpoints really, every single one tries to be more epic than the last, eventually we just need some flashpoints that are very easy to grind and short. Something refreshing. It would help this game out immensely if the developers put more time into variety, and less time into making large worlds. Generally speaking its better to have a wider variety, with less length than it is to have less variety with more length. Tl;dr: wasted space between mobs. There is no fast way to kill mobs. Even if you removed 100% of the trash it would take forever to get through some of these flashpoints. Nobody likes filler.

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=503822 Just a couple of posts bellow yours, answers it better than I could.

You are all getting hung up on "if the healer pulls Agro." That was one minuscule reason to guard them. I'm speed listing this so you can see every reason to guard and not have to read though a post because clearly people are losing a lot of the key facts. 1) Guarding a dps lowers your overall threat, specifically burst dps classes like assault vanguards. 2) Guarding a dps does nothing to benefit the group. 3) Guardig a healer reduces their already reduced threat down by 25%. Ever hear of min / maxing? That's what we are doing here. 4) Guarding a healer gives them another 5% damage reduction for those cases that something big hits them and I'm too far or incapable of helping them. I.E. the false emperor when each player fights alone. 5) What happens when a dps pulls Agro? Nothing. 6) You SHOULD guard a dps that pulls Agro constantly and you can't manage to keep threat. 7) You SHOULD guard anyone that is taking high AoE damage, and if the entire group is then make sure you guard the healer because healers tend to not heal themselves. These are the 7 main points I have been trying to bring to light, if you want to respond I ask you don't just respond with 1 reason you shouldn't guard the healer. All the mechanics explained I thoroughly understand, but mechanics are not logic. Please continue to blindly guard the dps that wouldn't pull off of you in the first place, and I'll continue to guard the healer for just in case emergencies or the dps when appropriate or any player that will be taking additional damage. I understand you think in theory that guarding a healer won't make it easier to rip threat off a healer, but I can promise you it's a huge difference from experience. Guard is highly flexible, all I'm trying to say us don't hate on people just because they guard healers. There are many good reasons to guard a healer.

Thank you, it lets me know I'm at least making sense. It is amazing how rigid the player group of this game is -_- I have to deal with it constantly in pugs.

I chose biochem because the stims / adrenals are better. Even once BW nerfs the future ones I will still be able to make them instead of buying them (as it stands right now I have a constant +1k health and extra defense rating 24/7 thanks to my stim, I won't be losing that any time soon). Level an alt with cybertech - the tanks benefit a lot from biochem IMO. Adrenals are insanely potent and I pop mine often, I mean 2k armor isn't a joke. I think it pushes me from 52%-63% reduction (this probably isn't accurate).

It really depends, on use vs static is preference (I'm bundling proc into here). On use you should "equalize over time" that's not it's function. On use provides a nice and often significant boost to mitigation during crucial periods. The static relics provide a constant benefit but offer no safety net in dire emergencies. I have both and switch constantly. Boss fight? My mitigation is pretty high already so dire moments tend to be more the issue. AoE trash? I find the constant bOnus more useful. Running a hm fp / before final boss - constant relics tend to work better (usually don't even need to pop CDs) With that said I'm full Rakata / BH... When I was all orange / lower than tionese I ran On use relics. let me put it this way- adrenaline rush + absorb adrenal + relic + Rakata medpac + defensive screen = short term immunity from damage and an actual GAIN in health. Don't even get me started solo play! Relic + defensive screen + absorb adrenal + adrenaline rush + medpac + heroic moment + light side damage reduction = just can't be killed. Not to mention add in Elara's healing and additional cc... Sorry off topic. You get the point though. The less you need boosted mitigation or dire moments mitigation the less you need on use relics. They just offer a different style of play

Maybe I failed to explain my points so I'll boil it down to the essence. Why do you guard dps? Do they pull Agro on random mobs? Do you ever need to pull off a dps? No. You taunt off a dps because that gives you an Agro lead. Dps can handle damage from bosses let alone a champion in a flashpoint. Healers can't heal as efficiently the second 1 ranged mob starts to hit them. Dps will encounter no issues. The healer should be guarded at all times because if for any reason there are any errors the healer will be the first to Agro. If you can't understand why that's important than clearly you aren't understanding the issue. A healer that has been guarded can easily have threat ripped off them, in your world of perfection that wouldn't be an issue but after having pugged 100+ hms I can tell you right now that never works out. Healers need the 5% damage reduction and the 25% threat reduction. You said 5% is useless? What about when they pop CDs? Definsive buffs stack together to make incoming damage a joke. Let me remind you of something. As a tank, endurance is your best bet when you want to increase time to live. Shield, defense, nothing adds more to you time to live than endurance. Until you add in heals. At that point as long as hps=dps-mps you will = alive. The healer is the most crucial component to your team, without one you can't win. Let me try to sum this up for you: guard a dps - you lose threat and the gain 5% dr. Guard a healer - they lose threat and gain 5% dr. If that still doesn't make sense to you, then we'll just have to agree to disagree. Clearly you have threat issues with Dps and I don't, so why would I ever guard a dps when it's the healers life that determines whether or not the group succeeds. Sorry that got a bit ranty, my phone is annoying to type on.

If you're more or less full columi you will be fine, as long as you have a good healer and a good team. When I run with my guild we 1 shot everything, but when I pug - even with talking to them and a gear check we still will wipe once or twice on the first boss. It generally comes down to you getting every Incenerate and moving in a predetermined order so that the healer can do their job.

Now I agree it's up to the tank to decide who gets guarded, what I disagree on is your mentality. You're being stubborn, as an endgame PVE player I know for a fact there are fewer reasons now to guard a dps than a healer. Let's break it down. Boss fights: Dps is guarded, generally the top dps. Why? The way threat mechanics work you're blowing tons of potential threat! Remember our taunts boost us anywhere from 110%-130% threat. That dps going crazy fuels your threat higher. Nerf their threat and you Nerf your own. Trash pulls: Dps is guarded and attacking weakest mobs. Great. Until a pat walks into your healer / a random AoE unfortunately knocks player x into mobs. Guess who gets lots of Agro? Not the dps. It all goes to the healer, Sonia you have to snap enough threat on all of them. What if your taunts are on cd? It won't be easy pulling threat off of massive AoE heals or large single crits. What happens when a dps pulls threat? Nothing. I've never had a wipe because dps kept pulling threat. I have seen many times where I am ammo starved trying to pull every mob off the healer because they are too spread out / ranged for AoE threat and I have to ion pulse each mob. I'm a full Rakata / BH Vanguard and I've cleared all the content in the game except 16 man content. Guarding dps is a waste of threat and nothing else. The only time it's needed is when they outgear you.

I recently hit item level 140 in every slot (Rakata) and have found tanking hard modes difficult on ammo since I dodge so many attacks now. Because of this I've actually tried what you thought of, and it is not worth it. I proc the relic almost every time it's on cd with just 1. 2 would be wasted. Honestly if you're in the same position is suggest trying what I do now: I'm a biochem so I run with the endurance stim and armor adrenal normally. If you don't use these just drop the * portion from my list. Columi Dps MH Champion dps relic Proc dps relic (I have the internal one, so that's what I use) ***Aim stim ***Crit adrenal This lets me hover around the same stats a full columi tank will have yet I do a lot more dps. When I do the daily regular mode (I like my easy daily coms!) I drop even more gear for columi / Rakata level dps gear. Tionese gear is a bit too much of an endurance drop for me.

You item level needs to all be around 136, which is Columi, in order to tackle LI. Someone like me will check to make sure, personally idc about pvp vs Pve as the difference is minimal. However, I suggest having more items around 140 as your group will struggle with such low hp / damage. Many players will be very strict and will not run it unless you are pve geared and half columi / half Rakata. Edit- there is currently no other way to obtain rakata. It only drops on hm li and operations.

You have 2 choices: Settle for columi or Tionese Run Lost Island hard mode until it drops for you Ops are actually the slowest way to get the Rakata chest now, then again Li isn't a cake walk.

I had figured the issue stemmed from that on my healer (lvl 23 smuggler) I noticed a lot of te low level tanks doing that... Even with the boost to threat in 1.3 hammer shot is a hair too weak after a big heal or if the healer has a lot of hots up. If the healer is guarded its enough to pull off almost immediately, small difference but sometimes there are situations this can create an issue. Honestly though it's only ever been an issue with bad dps. So if you roll exclusively with guild runs of hm flashpoints or only run ops you'll never encounter a situation to guard a healer (within reason).

Part of the reason troopers aren't ranged tanks is simply because melee mobs will always run into melee. It would be silly to have a full ranged tank that was based on range yet the vast majority of adds are in melee range. Vanguard shield spec has a lot of great range threat, much more than any other class. Sometimes I get lazy and stop melee tanking because the mobs did before dps threat exceeds mine so I'll just spam ion pulse, hammer shot, and sticky grenade.

Actually its completely up to the tank who they decide to guard. If dps is constantly pulling, then dps. If there is a lot of AoE going on in melee, then melee. If there are random AoEs being dropped everywhere, then the healer is best. If there are many mobs that spawn after a pull, healer again is best. I run almost exclusively with guard on my healer. Why? Remember when you said that if you're healing and no one hits the mob? What about when I hit the mobbut it's still too far for me to Agro with my main skills AND taunt is down? This actually happens a lot, especially during speed runs. Sure I have all the main mobs on me but if dps is slacking and not picking up the little guys, that is going to kill you with spell knock back. With guard up, a simple hammer shot (no resource cost) will pluck the enemy off you. Without guard? Most likely 2-3 hammer shots, possibly an ion pulse, or maybe even a stockstrike / high impact bolt. As a tank, I know the people who pull Agro the most and take the most damage in an encounter. It's not always the dps, it's almost always the healer. Why? Because when dps attack, unless they AoE, they pull 0 Agro on additional mobs. Healers however constantly Agro ALL mobs. This is a major issue, specifically in situations with mass - spread out weak mobs. That's why tanks put guard on healers. Dps just don't need it anymore.

Oh I hope this is true! I have yet to raid all that much (past week has been our first week), but it seemed like everything else dropped a LOT (I only had one drop) yet we had plenty of knight / consular / smuggler drops (2/2/2 of each).

If you already have a FULL (read earpiece, implants, relic, mh, oh, head, chest, bracers, belt, pants, and boots) then you have no issue and can tank HM EV, HM KP, and story mode EC. Also with a good group you could tank nightmare EV and KP. I know this because I've tanked the above in worse gear. Those silly little mitigation stats are the crucial component to how you will survive and are all that matter when tanking. I've seen 24k Hp commandos who think they can tank hm flashpoints and run ahead of me, the healer burns all their energy just to eventually let them die. Endurance alone does not make a tank. Also your aim will decrease, that's what threat handles. Since you deal extra threat you won't need as much dps . Just make sure you spec 31/8/2 for maximum survivabity while you are learning tanking tactics. Honestly if you've never tanked in an MMO there is a good amount to learn. It just takes time and research to figure everything out but of its what you enjoy go for it! If your guild ever wants to run ops then they will need more than one tank, bioware has made it clear that they will w creating future ops that focus on having 2 tanks. Also, in a guild like mine, we are almost ready to start up multiple groups and are looking for additional members ASAP. I hope some of this helps!

Thanks for the response! I had actually just figured this much out, I thought I had 1 shield relic and 1 defense but somehow I bought the same 2! This may have been on purpose while I had more +defense but I can't remember. Hopefully this week will be lucky for me! We have hm EV and KP on farm practically, but I'm the only trooper which means unlikely drops for me (but if they do drop its mine!) Also a bit more exciting is that we've just cleared up to firebrand and storm caller on our first raid night, so hopefully more rakata will be incoming. Really appreciate the feedback.

Hey, Thanks for the fast reply! Here is the link to my gear: http://swtor.askmrrobot.com/character/965010a0-e67f-4ce7-8681-3a2f576cc62d I just bought the BH implant, wow what an upgrade. The rest is what I've been working with, the advice you gave is pretty much what I assumed, it just stinks. I've managed to keep my shield stats pretty high, I'm thinking of switching a relic for a +def one however I'm just waiting for something to drop. We're clearing hardmode Karagga and EV hopefully this week so I'm sure I'll be able to get some more BH gear soon Thanks again for all the help, very kind of you.

Hey Op I was hoping you could help me find the mods I'm after. I am a Vanguard tank, and am in full Columi. I hate the itemization of it because I have tons of accuracy and very small amounts of absorb. My stats really aren't that bad though, (this is all approximate) 16% defense, 53% shield rating, however my absorb is only 32%. I'm currently saving black hole commendations so I can get the implants / ear piece (which are properly itemized), what would be the best way to lose accuracy and increase absorb? Are there alternatives that arent commendation based so I can re-itemize? I ask because with my modded gear upon hitting 50- my defensive stats were already very close to where they are now. Except my shield rating was at 45% and my absorb was at 43%; of course my health and aim were MUCH lower. Now I've had an increase in TTK because of endurance but I find myself overall taking more damage compared to the quality of gear I'm wearing. This bothers me a lot. When I first hit 50 healers were amazed by how little damage I took, claiming that I rivaled most columi geared tanks if it were not for the endurance, now I understand exactly why. What would be your suggestion to fix this issue? Just ignore it until I'm in all black hole / campaign mods? I feel like there is a better solution but I just can't find it. If there isn't then I won't worry about it for a couple of months as that is about how long it will take for me to get "end game" geared.