Thanks, I was in a rush, but I was very surprised to see that stockstrike was tech. If anyone uses shields in pvp I think they'll find it will only help against the occasional high damage burst (ex: aimed shot, charged burst repeated) rather than consistantly against every class. 40% of 1 aimed shot could be 1000 damae prevented, so it is hardly useless.

So I checked at lunch. 100% of vanguard attacks are tech. I checked some low level alts, smuggler charged shot, aimed shot, quick shot were ranged, everything else tech. Jedi consular melee attacks all melee, all ranged attacks force.

I'm not at home, so this is a guess (correct me if I'm wrong), but you get roughly 10-20% damage mitigation through absorb(40% chance to reduce by 40% is 16% mitigation), but not on tech/force attacks, so stockstrike, hib would probably be mitigated, but dots, ion pulse, probably not. Not sure on each classification but I assume out of damage dealing abilities it is pretty split between the two groups. This is the same as armour protection though, since internal/elemental attacks (plasma cell dot, ion pulse) go past armour and physical/energy (ion cell dot, stockstrike) don't.

thanks!

I think the S311 Fusion Saboteur is the one from the trooper progression video (judging by its icon). Got it on the trade network, can't equip it yet, will post a pic when I can.

I think defense might be broken, is that the one that makes you dodge so much you can't use skills?

Wow, so as far as I can tell, I can have a gear/heatsink/missle launcher on my shoulder (ugly) or look like a *****. Great. Why can't I just have that blue armor in the trooper progression video?

I was surprised that sticky grenade does damage to all nearby mobs but assault plastique doesn't. Makes it do less damage in a lot of circumstances

Patrol looked the most aggressive dps wise but its for commandos with alacrity. Fortuneately all the alacrity is in the enhancement mods so they're easy to swap out. I bought 2 green 2 blue and 1 purple replacements on the trade network for 8k.

I recently switched to assault spec and was surprised to learn that while they say that ion cell and plasma cell do similar damage, ION is energy damage (subject to armor, so reduce by 30-50%) but plasma is elemental (usually 0%). Ion ticks (at level 40) do 65 damage, plasma almost 200, (I'm at work, this is by memory)... I would never go back to ion unless fully specced for it. I just realized why they have a cast time on it: if u didn't, you have enough talents to have good plasma cell, cast ion attack, (guaranteed burn), ion cell, stockstrike (electric dot), high energy, (fast run speed), its not designed to play like that and its not balanced for it. Would also be less fun to play.

Thanks for the tips on crouching behind cover. I didn't know that green shields meant full reduction and that even though my portable cover was shining into an object I was still getting full avoidance. I assumed it would be animation and icon specific for the difference between the two protection types but instead it seems to be true line of site calculations for whether or not they hit a natural barrier. I am truly impressed.

Damage range on orange rifles scales with barrel upgrades which armstech can make, so u can easily get on the trade network. There is a generic rating (at level 30 I have rating 70 I think) which scales the damage based on weapon type. Armour plating does the same thing for orange armour based on the rating, armour piece, and type (heavy), so for armour this means that while u do need heavy armour or you lose a percentage, u can get an early set and use it the whole game, rifle too. Modable ones only though.

Haha, hard mode, that's awesome. Never thought about it but itd be pretty cool to see a level 50 who was still an undecided "trooper"

Best I have heard it described was 50-60% effective at 30m, 90% at 10m, and 100% at 4m. One of the trees makes you more reliant on that 4m by giving you another no cooldown melee ability in gut. I usually start fights at 30m, storm in, stockstrike, then fight from 10m, running in one in a while to stockstrike again. (Stockstrike is one of the hardest hitting abilities but is on a 10s cooldown I believe.) In pvp it is fun because being slowed doesn't really affect us much, 10m is a large cushion when your chasing someone. Even if they get outside that I can still hit them with a full auto or explosive round.

I was thinking of going m14x for the looks, but I'm armstech, is outfitting him going to be hard? The healing girl can just use my scraps, I don't even know how ill get armour for m1

I'm at level 18 with a tactics vanguard, so basically just getting started. Who works better for levelling (solo), elara or that tanking robot? Where do I get armour/weapons for a droid? Thanks

Tactics doesn't really get going until level 20-24 when you get gut, high energy cell. I've leveled both to level 19 and naturally they felt very similar but i die maybe 6 times instead of 8 as shield spec in pvp... Didn't really notice much dps but why would I? High impact bolt I use a lot more and it does way more damage with the armour penetration vs some enemies... And since I'm still using plasma cell it is up a lot more. Expect tactics to get a lot better with high energy cell.

Well ion cell for shield spec and plasma for assault for sure. Tactics is kind of fun because you can use either. Plasma procs allow high impact bolt, but ion cell you take a lot less damage, so even without talents it is good to use both in tactics. Tactics itself is designed for the third, high energy cell, that you get at level 20... Increased damage, faster run speed in combat, and 25% faster ammo regen (1 every 6 seconds) compared to the rate when the bar is full.