Well, even a Pyrotech can solo most Heroic 2's, if you're sensible about it. Heroic 4's might be a handful for a Shieldtech, and some of the hardest ones will likely still require a group, but I think a lot of the moderate ones should be fine, so long as you're not trying to do them when the mobs are +2 or anything.

Depends on what you want to do. If you want to just do normal quests, story line, a little PvP on the side...Pyrotech. If you want to solo heroics as well...Shieldtech or Parakeet.

That's more or less my spec, and I have hit 450,000 with it, but only once. I average around 300,000. Mind you I don't have a ton of expertise, and it always seems to be the same 5-10 Battlemasters in every warzone, so I spend a lot of time dead.

Everyone starts somewhere, guy. You didn't come out of the womb a crackerjack PvP player. Those same yutzes who are running the ball into their own end zone today could be tomorrow's battlemasters. They won't be, though. They'll decide PvP "isn't for them" because some idiot keeps /spitting on them or running them down in chat, and yet another game won't have a PvP focus because it's too "niche". Besides which, people who actually enjoy balanced PvP don't go looking for it in MMOs in the first place, but that's a whole other kettle of fish.

I agree that seeing the same faces over and over again lends an air of personality and engagement that you lose by going cross server. There's no question. However, I will take balanced, competitive matches over familiar faces 100 times out of 100, and if you care a whit about PvP, so should you. However, judging by the part of your post I bolded, I don't think you do care about PvP. I think you care about beyblades and sneakers and whatever the hell else eleven year olds care about these days.

I've been doing 50 PvP for a little over a week now. I have a nicely populated server, queue times are alright (even if it is Huttball 90% of the time), and I've been reasonably successful. I can claw in 5-7 medals and 75ish commendations with clockwork regularity, win or lose. The match quality, though, has declined rapidly in the last 4-5 days. First day or two it was nice, competitive, fun, frantic. Now, it's the same 15-20 people doing PvP every...single...day. It's gotten to the point where as soon as I see who is on what team, I know exactly how the match will end, and exactly how lopsided it will be. Wins feel just as bland and perfunctory as the losses. I can only imagine what it would be like for a new 50 who wasn't familiar with PvP, and came in with no expertise. Some of these guys can kill me in a single stunlock, and I have decent gear. Cross realm queues are pretty much a necessity at this point, and the sooner they can separate the premades from the pugs, the better.

Speaking as a "melee" class, + run speed in any substantial quality would be crazy OP.

Epic Swimwear. +5 Speed, +5 Charisma. Those damn noob countries just need to grind their OWN swimwear!

It makes no sense to me. It's like going to play some football, and then demanding after you win that you want special pads that will make winning easier next time. The whole concept is so ANTI-competitive it blows my mind.

Isn't quality competition a reward in and of itself?

We ALL miss DAoC.

Yarp. Due to Funcom, it'll likely be a train wreck at release, but we can always hope. Any game with 3 factions and world PvP will get at least cursory interest from me until the next DAoC is identified and acquired.

Well it's too late for THAT, unfortunately. But we can still hope it doesn't disappoint!

In this, my friend, we are in 100% agreement. Personally, I'm looking to GW2 and TSW to get my PvP itch scratched.

How many is "a ton"? If we assume 1-1.5 million players at the moment, what percentage of those would "the ton" of people you personally know represent?