Sorry, Jedi Knight is my main class, the Commando is an alt, so I'm not familiar with what IO/Assault means? I'm Gunnery spec so I'm not sure if that's applicable to me.

If you're a subscriber, it's free. I decided not to level my commando & operative as heals this go around, so I respeced them both to DPS yesterday. I can't speak to non-subs, as I don't think I've ever tried to respec while not subbed.

Thanks for the advice, and your point about the pre-cast is a great point I wasn't really thinking about. I might not be able to use MB or HoB for more reasons than cooldown. I can see where those are useful to preload some DPS while waiting for grouping, period. So Explosive Round... is there any reason to have it on my toolbar in PVE? Do you use it during movement when your mobile abilities are on cooldown? Same for Stock Strike... take it off the toolbar? Or keep it for the occasional time something gets in my face? I just started SoR on this guy so I've got 4 AFK-flashpoints to work out my rotations in at least... the guide on Dulfy was really great for getting a feel for the single target abilities, but they didn't write anything for AOE.

Just returned after over a year, and trying to learn my classes again. What should I be using for my AOE rotation on a Gunnery Commando? I get that Mortar Volley is my heaviest hitter. Plasma Cannon & Hail of Bolts are close in DPS (for a Commando anyway) Plasma Grenade & Sticky Grenade are each like 1/4 of a Hail of Bolts, but PG takes like over 7 seconds to do that damage (counting the cast time) and SG takes like 5s to detonate. Hail of Bolts does 4 times their damage every second it's ticking, right? Explosive Round is actually pretty good for being mobile, but still not as much DPS as hammering out Hail of Bolts. So is it just Mortar Volley and Hail of Bolts for my AOE cycle? I guess with a non-combat pre-cast Plasma Grenade + Hail of Bolts would work if Mortar is on cooldown.

There's a flip side to the blind invite not being considered: When I'm running a quest, and I see you're running the same quest I am, I'll target you and click invite, then go back to doing my quest, to share credit. I've had (on more than one occasion) someone LOSE THEIR **** because I blind invited while zipping through a clicky quest, and wanting to share credit. Last week, I told the guy, "Sorry, was trying to share credit before I killed this mob." They CONTINUED to lose their ****. So I proceeded to click every single quest objective right after they initiated combat. I can be a jerk, too. Just apply some common sense--sometimes when you get blind invited it should be OBVIOUS why.

There's a flip side to the blind invite not being considered: When I'm running a quest, and I see you're running the same quest I am, I'll target you and click invite, then go back to doing my quest, to share credit. I've had (on more than one occasion) someone LOSE THEIR **** because I blind invited while zipping through a clicky quest, and wanting to share credit. Last week, I told the guy, "Sorry, was trying to share credit before I killed this mob." They CONTINUED to lose their ****. So I proceeded to click every single quest objective right after they initiated combat. I can be a jerk, too. Just apply some common sense--sometimes when you get blind invited it should be OBVIOUS why.

Something I'd like to tack on for the budding 55 Sentinel/Marauder: Getting your first set of endgame gear crafted is a great way to jump into HM flashpoints and operations. Blue prototype tier 28 (aka blue 66 rank, aka 148 rated) is very cheap and easy to get into. Purples 28 / 66 / 156 rating isn't much harder, though admittedly more expensive, plus purple 66's drop in 55 HM FPs so you might just wait to get them that way. But what hilt/armoring/mods/enhances/augments do you take? I think it was pretty clear in the thread so far that a Mod has either Power or Crit on it. An Enhancement has either Shield, Surge, Alacrity, or Accuracy on it, AND ALSO has either Crit or Power. Augments can have any stat. So what I recommend is taking Strength + Power mods, Surge + Power enhancements, and Might augments. I like Might augments because they give you crit and power, and the crit they give you is on a separate DR. Your big abilities that rely on crit get a huge crit boost from talents, anyway--so the heavily DR'd crit rating doesn't have that much of an impact, compared to more power, or more surge. Then you get Accuracy on your ear/implants. If you aren't to 300 accuracy, then take some accuracy augments until you get to 300, then Might for the rest. The reason I recommend Accuracy on augments instead of on enhancements is that you get MORE Surge on an enhancement than you do Accuracy--they aren't a 1:1 trade-off. While on augments, you get the same amount of Accuracy or Surge. My 55 marauder has full purple 66 mods, enhancements, and augments, plus a set of purple "Hawkeye" ear/implants, which get him up to 300 accuracy just on those three slots!

I'll second this--I have to deploy the software from our developers upstairs at work, and one of them has a life. His pushes suck, I have to roll them back about half the time.

I recently applied for recruitment into PAX, and since joining, my game time on SWTOR has improved sooo much. Flashpoints, operations, warzones, just farting around, chatting with folks, chatting via Shoutbox at work, looking at all the OTHER GAMES they play... It's a real community, and something I've been really thankful to get an opportunity to be a part of. Plus... some really hilarious comments in the recruitment thread. I'm actually expecting to see my IRL best friend join soon!

Yeah, you understand where I'm at. The question was really regarding getting ranked pieces, period. I'm still just going to collect my full Partisan set, and optimize it before 2.4. Then I'll start working on Conqueror. But I know that eventually I'll be getting ranked pieces and I was just wondering if I should make sure I don't get attached to the trade-in set.

When you buy a piece of Conqueror gear, is the required Partisan piece destroyed/spent, or do you just have to own it, but get to keep it? I'm assuming it's destroyed when you buy the ranked piece, but there's a facet of that which really, really sucks. You lose your attached augment kits. Yes, you can pull the mods out and put them in something else... but what if you LIKE the Partisan armor look?

I hate Scamper. I mean I HATE it. I don't know if Op healing is too strong, I don't know if they should have stealth and cover, I don't know if <insert tree> is too strong for Operatives. I just know that when a mother F-er catches the ball at the top of the ramp by midfield and SCAMPERS to the goaline in 4 GCDs--I hate that ability. Hey, let me spam Dual Saber Throw 4 times in a row. Or let me spam Saber Reflect. Let me use it as long as I have 6 focus/rage, and that's fair, right? I mean that's HALF my resource bar that I couldn't possibly fill up by hitting, being hit, leaping, throwing, choking, or just pushing Focus. Spammable Scamper is complete *********. It's the most broken ability in objective based PVP.

I just finished full Partisan (optimized) on my Marauder, and I'm working on my Guardian now. I'm about 1/3 of the way done with Partisan now. What will I do in the months till 2.4? Keep getting Partisan. Once 2.4 hits, I'll start getting Conqueror's. If I ever get full Conqueror's on my Marauder and Guardian before the next set comes out, I'll start getting whatever ranked gear there is. Why? Because that's the gear level I have time for. The only complaint I realistically have about the ranked gear is needing the shell from the previous tier. For instance, I really like the look of my Partisan gear on my Marauder. I also have full Eradicators. I took all the Partisan mods and put them in my Eradicators, and put all my PVE mods into my Partisan gear. I then realized that in order to get Conquerors, I'd have to destroy my PARTISAN pieces. Damn! THAT ticks me off. Does it actually destroy it, or do I just have to have it in my inventory? The latter would be awesome, and if it does destroy it, then it sucks and that's what we should be ************ about.

Section X is a separate area from the rest of Belsavis, just like Black Hole is separate from Correlia. It's easiest to get there by using the priority transport terminals located at Makeb, Black Hole, Ilum, the fleet (outside your ship hangar), etc. There are lots of dailies on Makeb; there is a terminal on the station you can grab them all from, or you can just fly to the areas where they are; I recommend the terminal on the station. Note that the Makeb dailies involve a lot of travel, and in my opinion are generally slow compared to Black Hole, Section X, or Czerka. This is because you shuttle to the right zone, then drive out to the daily and complete, then drive back to the shuttle, turn in your daily, and shuttle to the next area. On Black Hole, Section X or Czerka, you grab all your missions at the start, then just run a circle around the zone, completing the missions as you go. When you finish the last mission, you QT back to base and turn them in. I don't even do the actual Makeb dailies--I do the Makeb *Weekly* quest, because it rewards 12 elite comms. As I'm almost done needing elite comms, I won't even do that much longer. The staged weekly is obtained from the droid on the space station, and requires you to complete 7 total quests. Don't do any quests requiring you to go to the Mining Mesa, and you'll save 30 minutes. (Abandoned Mining Mesa is fine.) Black Hole is easy. You grab the quests up, and start killing for the Area quest while working on the other objectives. I go counter-clockwise on republic and empire, stopping into each instanced section as I go. As I'm finishing the last mission, I call out in general for a partner (or more) for the H4, knock that out, QT back to base and turn in, then travel to Section X. Do the same thing there, then head to Czerka and complete that one. I typically only do them once a week now (for the bonus weekly credits) because I don't really need to buy anything anymore, but that's the dailies I prefer to run. Black Hole Section X Czerka If I'm still hard up for money, then I'd do Ilum next, followed by Belsavis, followed by Makeb, which takes the longest in my opinion.

It's really easy to determine your budget at a given gear level: For Basic gear (purple 66, tier 28, rating 156): Mods = 37 x 9 = 333 Enhancements = (66 + 43) x 7 = 763 Augments = 32 x 14 = 448 Then add in your ear/implants. Veracity ear/implants give 609. So for Basic gear (rating 156) your budget should be 2153. I use the 2300 column, or 1004/802/393 for my Guardian. Taking this a step further, since I know that my mods will be Def or Abs, and my Enhances will be Shield/Def or Shield Abs, I can plan out exactly what I'm taking to optimize. I'll take all defense mods and enhancements, then 3 def augs and 11 abs augs. I'll end up at 988/777/388. I've actually made a spreadsheet that does a lookup in the stat tables (I've got both the pVE and PVP versions for all three tank classes) and then I can specify how many of each modification I'm taking, and it will kick back how many augments I need of each type to hit my target number. Just a little mix-n-matching then to find the optimal spread.