I struggle to find a reason to run FP's beyond Esseles and Hammer Station. The XP and gear is little better than what can be obtained from questing. The point of dungeons in other MMO's is to provide challenging group content and provide better rewards than solo efforts. You have provided the challenging content but no better rewards. Why should I spend an hour or two in an FP when I can get better XP and gear questing? It gets worse at L50. Two OPS runs a week will gear you better and faster than running HM FP's. Most groups can clear reg EV or HM EV to SOA faster than running any HM FP. I see no purpose to running HM FPs. Why should I do these?

I wouldn't expect it to be a significant damage contributor. It's just designed to keep a DOT up on the target to help maintain aggro when switching targets and allow HIB to hit.

This is another reason to not run FPs. They currently have no point and are not a good use of time. BW needs to make them meaningful. Dungeons are the way to geared up and ready for raiding in every other game except SWTOR. I love the game and like the FPs but find no reason to run them.

I used the lizard the whole time and theran for the two tough class fights when interrupts are needed. Holiday's cc is a great interrupt. I tried some of the other companions but kept coming back to the lizard. He holds great aggro and does ok dps as long as you keep him in top gear.

My guild has a "discussion" of the worth of running HM FPs. Some of us believe it's not worth the time and effort considering: - 4 - 5 weeks of running the Ops will get you geared out - the gear drops in the HM FPs are only marginally better than fully modded Oranges - some of us have a rl and are time constrainted - rather do wz's or level an alt than spend 2 hours in an FP. Others feel there is valuable gear and drops in the HM FPs and, in time, we'll be able to do the FPs in under an hour, like in "other" games. An important note is we feel we have reg EV on farm and starting first HM EV attempt this week. Any thoughts?

Reg Ops are alot easier. EV can be completed with a few geared players and the rest fresh L50's if they are decent players. There will be wipes on SOA but it can be done. A hard mode is really hard for fresh L50's. Heck, a few a bosses in reg Battle of Ilum and False Emp are hard for fresh L50's unless they are really good players.

The game is not two months old and being played by seasoned mmo players. Sure there will be bugs and not enough content. Anyone who played WoW back in 2005 knows how rough it was, how long it took to get to L60 and how hard it was to make gold. Raids (all two of them, I think) were 40 man - meaning most players never raided. Remember how hard it was just to get a decent ubrs run, and then find out you had no hunter and, thus, probably couldn't do the last boss? Crafting sucked and you got disconnected all the time. Respeccing cost 50G and dual spec was three years off (and 1K gold when it got there). When Ensidia got hit for using a bug to kill the Lich King, they responded with a list of of all early raids and bad bugs contained there. Everyone who is complaining should search for that thread and read it to remind themselves of up a startup is like. I support large client server apps like these and know the first few months are constant bug fixes and little enhancements. It's impossible to catch all the bugs and issues in the testing periods. With all this said, this game has a total package that is better than anything I've played. I'm staying and not going back to wow or rift.

There are no ops that need more than one tank, unless maybe you are just starting and might have a lot of "Oh, #!?$, the main tank just died" moments. My main is a vanguard and I specced dps after the first ops. I still use my tank gear and switch to tank mode in the rare times I'm needed to tank. There are a bunch of threads lamenting the lack of off-tanking in the game. Basically, a guild needs just one reliable tank.

I'm L29 and this is what I do: On gold elites, I send in Kira and taunt off her when she gets to below 50% health. I dual silver elites, I send Kira to one and I take the other. She can usually kill hers without dying and helps me finish off mine. (it's sad when your companion has the better dps) I have to heal up after every encounter but the pace and speed is exciting and keeps me on my toes.

Probably Biochem if you want to get rid of your current prof. If you had been synthweaving from the beginning then you could have had the Rakata bracers and belt after the first two Ops runs (I did on my vanguard). By now you probably have nice gear and benefit of synthweaving might be lost. I can tell you the epic crafting armormech drops I've gotten on my vanguard are not that great. I hope they get better. The reusuable stims and medpacs will continue to be great because if you're like me, you go though them like candy. I make the blue ones on an alt. They are good but it's quite an effort to make them. You have to keep the crew busy all the time - it seems like the alt becomes the main and I only take the main out for raiding! BTW, leveling a guardian and synthweaving.

I use the Assault Specialist spec Guurzak linked and think it does fine. I have nice tanking gear and hit Ion Cell for "Oh, *&?!, what happened to the main tank" moments. I can briefly tank well enough to give time for the MT to come back.

I don't PvP but noticed in the early to mid forties mobs got alot tougher and I had to be more careful on my VG. Now at 50 with nice gear I can handle about anything short of multiple gold elites. Your gear will catch up and it will get better.

I thought so too, even with the comment "tanks don't need healers". Every post gets flamed at some point. Even the best threads always degenerate into a flaming session. No OP should take it personal. There are trolls lurking everywhere. My comment is based on experience leveling to 50 and doing the L50 dailies. I couldn't imagine doing it again without a healer.

You better start gearing Elara because you won't survive long without the heals.

I'm armormech and found the crafted gear was better at times than drops during the leveling process. You can also gear your main companion. At L50 the Rakata belt and bracers can be quickly made with some crafting mat drops in the first couple of ops runs. These will last a long time. There are recipe drops in the ops. Some are not too hot but I got a nice helmet recipe a few days ago. I'm sure there will be better ones as time goes on. I'm slowly leveling an alt for biochem because I eat the stims like candy.

I tried the VG dps specs but they felt clunky after being shield specced. I also didn't think the dps was any better. Of course there is the survivability of being shield specced. As for the "wall" - I though Voss was a big change in mob damage and taking on two silver elites became a challenge.

I'm using http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#801GRGrdoroTzZMsZb.1. My guild has several tanks and sometimes I dps. Taking Steely Resolve and Brutal Impact helps.

It's basically - get in melee range - Stockstrike, High Impact Bolt and Energy Blast on every cooldown - Fill with Hammer Shot and Ion Pulse. - Try not to let ammo get too low. Single mob pull is Storm (use Sticky Grenade until you get Storm) and then Ion Pulse (to get damage debuff). Group pull is Explosive Round, Storm, Explosive Surge. Be prepared to Harpoon the furthest mob to the group. Use Pulse Cannon when all grouped up.