I too can heal to full in DPS spec, but I can stealth away and do it without having to kill my target first! Poor mercs, they never get away to heal to full. I think DPS mercs may be one of the most nerfed PVP classes right now.

I think a major problem is with the most common classes in PVP not really being suited for killing op/scoundrel healers. Jug tanks don't do much (although I personally try to force push the scoundrel closer to all my DPS), the majority of the time all you can do is move the healer around. With how mobile I am and how easily I can break roots/snares, it's not really a problem. Mara are easy to kite when you have obstacles, and the same with snipers. The mara only end up giving me time to heal up when they stop me from running and snipers who break cover to be able to hit me again are going to be focused by our warrior classes. Having PT or sin tanks who can pull me into a group of ranged DPS in an open area, let's say a merc DPS for high damage and a sorc DPS for that annoying snaring while DPSing effect, this is going to get me killed regardless of what I do unless my tank comes and saves me. This still comes down to have needed 3 people to kill me, but I should go down fast in this situation. As for the EMP being a "stalemate" tool, it gives me time to LoS, it gives tanks time to taunt, it gives other healers time to heal me, and gives me time to have my cooldowns refresh, etc. It is, in no way, a tool that simply prolonges my death. If you do not burst me down from 30% I will not only outlive your damage, I will soon be able to completely heal myself in a matter of a few heals. The only real counter to this is that my resolve is resetting as well, but don't expect me to die simply because you throw one more stun in there.

I stopped watching about 5 minutes in. For one thing, he was dieing when 3 or more players were attacking him if you follow the tracers and melee fighters (this is not exactly groundbreaking news). He was not being well guarded at all, no one seemed to try to peel off his attackers. He was letting people die when he could have just popped out of stealth and started healing, which seemed odd but it was a casual match anyways so maybe he was trying something out. He had several opportunities where he could have rolled away or broken LoS and easily survived or reduced the damage he took significantly, and instead he pretty much stood there and died. Had it been a rated match I am sure he would not have played in such a vulnerable manner. You forgot damage reduction, which reduces the bonus damage from expertise and thus allows bonus healing to match it just fine. In-fact, it was balanced at some point to do just this. My scoundrel could do with less mobility as a healer, thus making it more reasonable to actually assist to kill one. Pug groups it is really bad, given I have the mobility and resources to survive up to 4 attackers as long as I have an object to kite around. The sad thing is, the class that usually has the best means of chasing me down and killing me are other scoundrels/operatives who are rolling after me lol.

These random pieces of tanking gear which my juggernaut could use had they been without the alacrity seem very unusual. Is there any reason why I would want alacrity on tank gear, at the very least on something other than an assassin where I could possibly see it being beneficial (although less so than mitigation stats)?

What I am having problems with in most of these arguments is how DPS scoundrels can be considered the absolute worst at surviving yet healer scoundrels are the best healers. I could offer an extesive list of differences but let me just shorten this by saying both DPS skill trees offer more or better survival tools or stuns.. A significant difference is also that if I need to survive I can expend energy for getting away where as when I am heal spec my energy can rarely be spared for a series of escape rolls. Keep in mind that if you are not healing then someone else is. As an example of a match, you have a heal scoundrel and a DPS scoundrel in the same group. Would everyone say the DPS scoundrel would be instantly killed while a heal scoundrel would be nearly immortal in the fight? As a legitimate question to everyone, why is it that a healer can keep himself alive while guarded more easily than keeping a DPS of the same class alive while they are guarded instead? The DoT specs are a serious threat and produce substantial damage, so if the only issue is their survival then I would appreciate an explaination of why they have a problem with surviving beyond "because they have a problem with surviving". Just to clarify, I have never said scoundrels are not a squishy class, but being squishy and being unable to survive are two entirely different things.

It's generally the same with the way I spec, when the damage starts it just streams out until the target dies usually. The majority of the DoT damage is also to a single-target, not to an entire group, or do people not think that DoT damage matters on a target you are also doing your single-target DPS to? It just happens that the people around my target are also getting DoTs, but I've not even had my lethality sniper produce as much single target DPS because of the way the upper hands / tactical advantages and the whip / knife proc works. Why should I play something else if it works for me and it is a lot of fun? No one is questioning the strength of the "top 3" but to argue nothing else should even be used is just non-sense.

Operative in voice chat "AOE stun inc" Rest of the group holds off on spamming tons of AOE. When this becomes complicated let me know. Also, just because you can't survive on an operative/scoundrel does not mean others cannot. You may have your strengths with other classes, but do not assume your failure is universal to all of us.

That is a very good point, and while I was focusing on using the elemental type attacks I did not actually consider how much this was benefiting me over melee/ranged attackers. My damage is not better, other's damage is worse. I would still say there is an advantage to any class using elemental or internal damage types but this is a very good "Ah ha" moment as to why my numbers are high.

Thanks for the good posts, gave me enough to consider. I was hoping for a sustained AOE or DoT damage class, something that would work more effective than a lethality/DF spec agent/smuggler (for group damage rather than burst damage), and give me a chance to focus on disrupting healers while maintaining that group pressure but I'm feeling that its not going to be as effective for that. Probably stick with my new sniper, I love both engineer and lethality specs and have already used both extensively.

Just to clarify, my sig is not accurate, so I hope you were not trying to use that. My cast time for underworld medicine is 1.8 seconds on my DF scoundrel, it builds upperhand which allows me to use more wounding shots, I can get an instant-use heal from a proc on my roll ability, my AOE and regular dots do not effect my flashbang, and I would seriously hope you are not equating stupidity as some sort of reason for why scoundrels are not viable as a DPS. The stupidity part being players who AOE break AOE stuns...this is PVP 101 here and you are acting like serious PVPers are going to be doing this all the time. P.S. During the gree event me and a sentinel were taking on groups of 4 while I was in DPS spec, the heals are difficult to use if you are against a good group, but if you are not the main healer then you can heal quite well while building upperhands for DPSing. Of course, my points in the heal tree may be uncommon, they work very well in small groups and 1 v 1.

How do you interrupt Operative culls considering they are instant and only limited by a global cooldown? I have done DoT spec on my sniper and my scoundrel and I'm thinking you are not exactly sure how Op/scoundrel works in DoT spec. Not that it matters, if you are terrible at playing DoT spec builds then it's simply one less player using it.

It would be funny and cause people to rage when trying to take stealth defended locations while using a stealther Hence, I don't really care about the suggestion just thought it would be an easy way to drum up some drama with some exaggerated sense of importance for being able to see stealthers while stealthing. The fact is, if someone finds you while you are stealthed and defending a location, you are doing it WRONG.

You are doing it wrong. /thread continued Godlymuppet is spot on with what I have noticed from a DF scoundrel as well. The wounding shots simply rips players apart and it is easy to maintain upperhand to use them as well. Surviving is simply a matter of mobility, and with the movement boost you should be faster than attackers and using your roll you can easily break LoS with players. You get a free heal from rolls occasionally, an effect which lasts a very long time, you have a good absorb buff with reduced cooldown, and you can keep players snared while using your main AOE tool. Utility, healing, survival, sustained damage, and burst damage. DoT scoundrel/Op is simply underrated and underplayed. Breaking mezzes on healers is not so much a concern, since the ones leaving the DoTs running on themselves are typically not very good or aware healers anyways, at which point I would simply burst him down.

The point of the post is for whether I can make an effective PT at 55 or not, and if there are some clear issues that others present then I will focus on a different class instead. If the differences are minor then I would not be discouraged from continuing my vanguard. My time could be spent on making a sage/sorc, sent/mara, or working on my second sniper instead, but I would rather avoid extremely common classes/builds if I can remain viable with an alternative.

Would love to see a cleanse proccing relic (none of these need to offer any stat bonuses), and the proc rate should be low but still viable. Something like 5% to 10% chance of activating upon taking damage with a 30 second cooldown would be the lowest rate. A relic with a resolve increasing proc upon taking damage would be an interesting choice for healers, but potentially a bit overpowering if the proc chance is too high. AOE or target based snare proccing relic would also be good with a minor speed decrease (30% movement decrease) and perhaps only a 6 second or so duration, enough to gain some distance on attackers. Taunt proccing relic, reducing damage in PVP but for less than a single target taunt would in both duration and amount. For PVE it would be handy for aggro management but would mean giving up a powerful mitigation proccing relic so it could be balanced (although I am not really a fan of making aggro management too easy). Main reason for this one is what I feel is a lack of use in relics for tanks in PVP, because a tank who is not being attacked is not benefitting from mitigation relics but there is nothing else tank oriented for them to use. Interrupt proccing relic, low chance to proc and no forced cooldown on targets. Would benefit classes with a significant number of APM and its random nature could prevent it from being overly effective. Would take a lot to balance these but I am mostly wanting some variety to the buff or proc damage/healing relics. I feel that what players would be giving up from the current relics somewhat balances these choices, but also the fact that some of these relics help balance each other makes it more viable as well (interrupt proc and resolve proc relics are good balancers).

Would prevent stealthers from detecting each other unless one of them unstealths. Good or bad? Up for debate, I think it would drastically alter objective based gameplay though so it could be interesting. Not something I would fight to support though so feel free to hate on the idea as much as you want

I recently rolled a vanguard and have been doing several matches of warzones with it, typically doing anywhere from 50% to 100% more damage than anyone else in the rounds. This is leaving me with a good impression of the class as in my experience with every other class I have rolled they only get stronger and more viable as they increase in level. This is only the level 10 to level 29 bracket of course, and I would not expect the experience with the class to remain the same. So, my question is what exactly causes PT / VG to be considered the weakest class in current PVP? I believe the class to be a balance between jug and sin as far as tanking and have little knowledge of how the damage rotations will work at this point, but I have seen exceptional stats from warzone boards. I am assuming it may be mostly fluff damage with little functionality in the match but I would like to hear some reasons from other players.

If you look at the screenshots it won't be like this, it actually looks like it works exactly like a flashpoint queue. In this way it should solve most of the concerns in this thread as well. If you get a message saying "would you like to enter" as you currently do, it will be for an 8 v 8 warzone. If you get a message asking you to confirm you are ready while displaying your role (heal, tank, DPS) then you know you will be entering an arena match. If you want to join arena instead of warzone, just decline to join the warzone and re-queue until you get your arena invite. It will also avoid 4 v 1 or similar situations because the match cannot start unless all 4 players indicate they are ready. This is simple deduction based on what was provided but I believe it to be an accurate explanation of how things will work.

The OP is right, it is rather unfair that combat rez does not work in WZ when other PVE abilities do work and have absolutely no restrictions/nerfs causing them to act differently. Two great examples, when I am using my jug I can use my AOE taunt and suddenly force everyone to stop killing my healers and DPS in the warzone and all those players suddenly focus their attention on my jug, who will now be using sabre reflect and soaking up uber massive cool guy damage and sending it right back. The other example is my operative using his de-agro tool when he has been attacked by two or more players. Because I use my de-agro tool, people just stop attacking me because I obviously just "surrendered" and they focus on something else, hopefully a tank who taunted them. Allowing taunts and de-agro tools to work in warzones as agro management tools but not allowing classes to resurrect players is obviously an attempt at bioware to show favoritism. Surely everyone experiences this same situation and can agree whole heartedly with the OP now?

So idiots are less of a liability in warzones...I do not see this as a problem or something bioware should be concerned with maintaining. I like how you use "guaranteed win" and "here is a counter to it" for the same subject. In otherwords, your strategy works 100% of the time except for the time strategies which are 100% effective at stopping your 100% guaranteed strategy occur. There are no guarantee's when players are fighting other players so I would advise you to avoid making any such claims. Welcome to non-ranked warzones, unless you wish to edit your statements to specifically refer to ranked warzones only, at which point I would be more willing to believe in the existence of a scout. Now, however, you just limited your potential node defenders by 1 by giving him a scouting role, and this is more risk than I would be willing to take in my groups. I would prefer to just pay attention while using voice chat to call out incomings. I'll try a different approach to my argument. Defenders are a resource, and a valuable one at that. Depending on the strength of an attacking force, the number of defenders necessary in a given area changes. Now, in the genius paper PVP discussions, people could argue for things like scouts or even going into much grander arguments such as only sending in two players at a time to defend each node, letting them be sacrificed to protect it from attackers, and rotate groups of two each time who will constantly die but constantly interrupt. This is one of those "guaranteed to win" tactics but it's not something you are going to see done, and thus you usually have players heavily defending an area being heavily attacked, with smaller groups at the less active areas. Before the CW change, fewer defenders were necessary to defend a side against larger groups when their only objective was to interrupt cappers. Now, it no longer takes simple interrupters but people actually killing the attacking group, otherwise the objective will be lost. The value of defenders has increased because their necessity has increased, and you are no longer forced to obtain and keep mid to win. I have seen warzones won since the change because both sides were captured, but this required people being observant and defenders moving between each point. It takes more tactical awareness rather than reliance on environmental benefits. Now, if you really want to stir up CW, then give the side that does not own a node a speeder with faster access to it Your all speeders open idea removes the ability to actually use tactical awareness of the warzone as players can stream into a node with no chance of sending defenders to meet them in time.

Ignoring this "tunnel scout" nonsense which no one ever uses because no one wants to sit inside the tunnel not getting any medals just to babysit a passageway. Other guy: "Let's just send one now so they think we are going for the side, let's come back out and sneak around the side to attack from behind." Enemy dude defending the side: "Incoming" This can go on and on. If the limit of your tactical ability in a warzone is this basic then you should not bother commenting on warzone strategies and their failures. Being predictable is not a problem with a warzone's design, its a personal issue you have to overcome.

Wait, how is this any different at all to how it was before? If they had Right and Mid and you needed to take one of the two positions then you have two choices, rushing right or mid...I am really confused how you think it is different because if the enemy team is actually watching, which is incredibly simple to do, they could see you using speeders to land at Left at which point you are either going to rush mid...or rush right. Sides are easier to take and harder to defend now, if you think it's harder on attackers because they are getting farmed when rushing into an overwhelming force on a lower level...well bugs fly into bug zappers all the time so maybe it has something to do with the player instead?

I currently roll with a 55 scoundrel and yes I think it is excessive. It would help if they fixed the rolling since there are places where I can get a 20m-30m or greater roll off which is the equivalent of force charging into an open space, rather unfair I think. Normal rolling also has no reason to be spammed. My survival as a healer is incredible as it is and the rolls more or less require ranged DPS to kill me now. In my DoT spec it's very simple to kite melee and evade AOE damage while still causing significant DPS to my targets so it doesn't quite feel balanced to me as it is. That said, I do remember what it was like before the rolls existed, and the mobility of sniper/GS and operative/scoundrel was terrible. The difference now, however, is that I have the equivalent of a speeder in warzones. The improvement went too far, I should not be equivalent to the speed of a player with 110% speed increase running while in a warzone. I would ask why does the roll need to be spammable? What is accomplished by spamming the roll and is it fair for it to happen? Even if the content is not environment objective based it does not mean there are no objectives taking place either. In the arenas the objectives will be killing players, and something which easily prevents the death of a player is potentially game breaking. Roll users are not tanks, they should not have extended periods of invulnerability without penalty. I would be satisfied with a cooldown or some sort of limitation such as reduced roll distance from extended use in the form of 12m -> 6m -> 3m and remain at that level until the limitation ends. The roll can stay as long as it is not being spammed, there are no defensive tools which function in such a repeatable manner other than heals themselves.

When the sniper and their opponent are fighting alone with no one else around.

What I am trying to say is that my point was about encounters being situational not L2P as you assumed I was saying. Also, although not being the point of my comment but if you are going to claim that there are no isolated encounters or situations where 2 players are fighting alone in warzones then I have to wonder what you consider relevant events in a warzone if not everything that happens in a match. Example, two stealthers attack a node in which you have two guards, one attacker and one guard kill each other. What do you now have at this time if not a 1 v 1 fight? I will grant you that this is not a common occurance, but the point remains, if you have a DoT spec attacking your tanks, the class best suited to handle them is not a juggernaut and therefore juggernaut is not the best tank in that situation. The same can apply to many other situations with the so called "best". Warrior classes being constantly snared/rooted are greatly restricted over any ranged DPS. Snipers in areas with lots of obstructions are easily avoided. Snipers who are moving are highly vulnerable and also risk prematurely ending their defensive abilities. Normal damage mitigation tanks lose out to internal/elemental damage where tanks with higher tech/force resistances are superior. Let's expand the tank situations to huttball as well. If the jug is carrying the ball he can be quite mobile, but there are ways to avoid being lept to and remove that advantage. If an enemy player has the ball, a jug is good at stalling the player but a PT or sin using pulls are far more effective at actually stopping or killing the players via traps. In this situation a jug tank loses to the other two in utility. Claiming that any one class is the best as a whole is narrow-minded. There are counters to each class and benefits to each class but they require certain situations. Players who fail to utilize their class where it is most useful and in a way it is most useful are at fault, not because one class is simply better than them at all times.