I can't tell if you're just dense and can't comprehend the pages full of posts answering your "so what?" question, or if you're trolling. Either way, you're repeating yourself with your fingers in your ears, refusing to try and understand WHY the high point gain from crafting is a problem. Maybe saying "i told you so" gets you off, but I'd rather see this game thrive.

The "beef" is that while conquest was advertised to be this huge deal where guilds could play to their strengths in their game playstyle, it instead boils down to players rich in mats and creds crafting their way to the top of the leaderboard, with the underlying "theme" of each week being nothing more than an afterthought. That is bad for the longevity of the game and serves to disillusion guilds with players that simply don't have the resources to compete like this.

You have a valid point, insofar as the larger guilds do not themselves take advantage of crafting. Conquest in its entirety is already skewed towards larger guilds. I know from personal experience that a smaller focused guild can beat a larger disorganized one. However, if a large guild decides to get organized and begins crafting meticulously, no smaller guild will be able to match that scale of point generation. Instead of depending on crafting as a "maybe" solution against larger guilds, we need a retuned conquest system that levels the playing field for all guilds.

This is very very important. The primary appeal of conquest was touted to be the ability for various guilds to play to their strengths during certain themes to compete for the title. During a PvP week, the PvP guilds should have an innate benefit. During PvE/GSF, the respective progression/starfighter guilds should have an innate benefit. As the system stands right now, regardless of guild size, players completing conquest goals, etc. A handful of VERY rich players with several alts can sink a LOT of money and mats into crafting which, along with the stronghold bonuses, nets them a vastly disproportionate amount of points per unit time invested into conquest when compared with other means of earning points. While conquest and GSH brought a lot of revitalization to crafting, it also hamstrung non-conquest crafters by disrupting prices and supply of mats in the market mainly because of how powerful crafting is in EVERY conquest week. In order to rectify this, BW seriously needs to revamp conquest goals and how crafting ties into them. Every single other repeatable objective requires the player to be actively doing something in-game: PvP/Operations/GSF/etc EXCEPT crafting, which by design can be done offline. A player with 10 alts can only do PvP matches one at a time on a single character. A crafter with 10 alts can craft 5 war supplies on each alt every 50 mins while doing something else. Crafting should not be a repeatable goal every week. Certainly not on weeks like Flashpoint Havoc, where the namesake goals are once-per-legacy. Having crafting be the core focus during the Trade Emporium or Titans of Industry makes sense. Having crafting be a huge point source during weeks that focus on other aspects of the game unbalances conquest and renders the theme of the week a moot point for guilds that are aggressively competing for #1.

1. Togruta 2. Voss 3. Zeltron Seriously though, Togrutas are the coolest looking alien species after the Chiss, IMO. I'm a little surprised they weren't introduced already.

Guild Website: http://fromashestc.swtornow.com/ We're a relatively small and close-knit group of players who primarily do PvE progression, with several of our players also very interested in PvP and Starfighter. This first week of conquests, we finished 3rd place on Makeb, beating out a few larger guilds by being organized and committed, but this will not hold as competition increases and gets more conquest focused unless we expand. In addition to conquest requirements, we had recently fallen behind on progression because several players from our core team decided to take a break from the game, and we wish to reinstate a regular progression team, and also set up 16 man operations. If you're looking for a fun group of people who will be willing to help you in all aspects of the game, From Ashes is the place for you. Please head over to our guild website and put in an application, and contact me in game via whisper or mail on my main: Dionysius. There are no gear/progression requirements. We would prefer, however, that you make a sincere attempt to integrate with the guild, get to know us, and help us get to know you.

wrong forum, please delete.

If you have a full set of PvP tank gear and a good healer buddy, you can handle the current HM 55 FPs just fine. When I switched to PvE tanking on my Shadow, that's what I did. Then the gear drops from FPs + stuff I bought with comms helped me build a decent PvE tank set very quickly. Also helps if you have alts to grind comms on so you can transfer mods through Legacy items to speed up gearing/itemization.

Well you have only one point left, so I'd say take Lightning Spire for improved range on LS and CL. But honestly, Lightning does best with the Thundering Blast auto-crit and cheap LS spam. In my opinion, you'd be better off going full Lightning for maximum damage. But of course, there's no harm in wanting to change it up a little. Let us know how this hybrid works out.

People choose what class to play based on either how much fun they have with it, or how much ACTIVE utility they bring to a raid. Nobody is going to set up a raid team based on buffs. Before the legacy buff system, there were many times when my raid team was missing a Consular buff because we didn't have one on our team. Didn't stop us from doing the content anyway. And really, its not anyone's concern how raid teams manage their comp. If a raid team wants to stack 4 Sents, 2 Juggs and 2 Sages, that's their prerogative. Trying to force variety by limiting buffs is nobody's call.

Really? Did you even read the dev response? Read properly before you start your QQ. They very clearly state that they agree that Shadows aren't balanced. Their rationale for the mitigation buff at the expense of self-healing is very explicitly stated. And their comments about reducing healer effectiveness are also valid. Maybe stop and think for a minute. But that would take away your opportunity to ***** at BW. Force forbid that...

This isn't a bad idea. The only outcome of this is that the level at which you acquire Salvation will be pushed back from 45 to about 49/50 or so. However, if you plan to heal often in PvP and PvE, getting the heal cost reductions and force pool increase will give you a better feel for how to manage your resource at max level, so you can keep doing what you're doing now. I haven't tried leveling in heal spec on any of my healing toons. Aside from HK (and possibly Treek, IDK) all my other comps take much longer than I would to kill mobs. But if you'd prefer leveling in heal spec, I'd suggest taking a melee DPS comp who has AoEs, or a melee tank comp. I just finish off with Project or TKT. IMO, the saber abilities for Sages are worthless if you have enough Force to cast ANY of your force attacks. If you're at 0 force, then I could see how the basic attack would come in handy. My saber strikes are on my quickbar, but I'm never in a position where I NEED to use them.

I too have recently started tanking on the Shadow, and its my first tank so far. I've played literally every spec but a tank, and I feel it's time to diversify so I hopped onto Shadow tanking despite all the issues it has. Loving it. But this question by OP is one I share as well. I'm generally good at figuring out when to use Deflection or Battle Readiness, based on outgoing damage I've seen tanks eat when I run stuff on my healers, but since Resilience only works on tech/force attacks, I have to currently wait till I eat a tech/force attack to know that's probably where Resilience comes in. Any insights into this would be great.

Scrapper DPS in PvP is kind of a joke, honestly. I feel weak when I play it as I'm rarely able to burst down players 1v1 due to unreliable crits. Dirty Fighting, however, is my favorite DPS spec after Infiltration. It has tremendous back-loaded burst and melts tanks fairly quickly. Your survivability is a bit better than in Scrapper, but not good enough to take on more than one player alone. I haven't tried the DPS specs in PvE so I can't comment on the applicability of Scoundrel DPS there.

Forctis Latin for 'power'.

So since you're so clearly a super pro at "TOTALLY dealing with stealth class", how does them having full time stealth affect your gameplay? You flat out refuse to play a stealther because you think it's an "abuse" (lolwut?) but continue to assert that stealth gameplay is boring and made for noobs. A bad stealther performs just as a bad any other class. If your idea of an adrenaline rush is resetting stealth timers then it's no wonder you find classes like stealth and warriors boring. If you've ever played a Shadow you'd know the rush you get from opening up on a defender in stealth and trying to kill him before he kills you so you can cap the objective. Sometimes it takes a wait of several minutes before the situation is ideal for the stealther to engage. It's part of the chase and where the application of untimed stealth comes into play. Once a stealth class becomes visible, their survivability drops exponentially, even Shadow tanks, after 2.0. L2Stealth.

Because OP Sorcs can heal to full.

No, my problem is that you think stealthers are criminals or socially inept based on your comments. And yeah sure you made the whole "oh not all of them, but some of them" cop out, but that's still a baseless generalization stemming from your dislike of the class, most likely because you lose to them more often than not, regardless of your stance that you can "easily shut them down". When I first rolled my GS, which was my 2nd toon, I got ganked all the time by Ops and Sins. Instead of crying about it, I rolled an Op and a Sin so I could L2P. 'Sneak up on someone and stab them in the face' is a playstyle. It's not like stealth classes have awesome survivability after they engage someone.

So, just because you can't see them coming, because they selected a class that gives them a tactical advantage in PvP, they're criminals or socially inept. That's friggin glorious logic. Maybe tone down the butthurt and call inc.

Only way to "confirm" anything is if you do this: and decide if its unnecessary based on YOUR stealth gameplay. Just because YOU don't understand how stealth is applied, does not mean it IS unnecessary. It's not even funny how fast DPS Scouperatives and Infil Shadows get burned when they run face first into the fray. The entire point of full-time stealth is the element of surprise, and even then, stealthers have to be wary of enemy stealths that can detect them, Trooper/BH stealth scans, and Snipers/GS who have passive stealth detection in cover.

This. Also, being in stealth forever isn't some superpower. The only thing stealthers can do under stealth is apply class buffs/guard/change stance. Anything else pulls them out or they can't do it (rest, mount, etc). So maybe I don't *need* to stay invisible for 10 mins at a node in Civil War. But it sure as hell beats reapplying stealth on a timer and potentially giving away my position to enemy players and/or making me vulnerable to OTHER stealthers. Play a stealther so you understand the mechanic instead of showcasing ignorance in a public forum.

Like Pilgrim said, stealth classes are the biggest pain in your *** if they get the drop on you. As a GS, its your responsibility to position yourself so that they can't sneak up behind you, as your stealth detection only works in front of your character. Deception sins can really mess you up if they manage to open on you, but if you survive it you can pop a medpac+adrenal, call for help if guarding, and roll away to put some range between you two. Odds are if you start shredding the sin, they will vanish. At that point, drop a "Sweeping Blasters" immediately at the last spot they were. If you're lucky you may be able to pull them back out. Leg Shot and Flourish Shot are your friends. Concealment ops used to be a huge problem for me personally, but given how sadly gimped they are lately, if you manage to put some distance between the two of you, you're most likely not going to die.

Hit Potency in stealth and open with Spinning Kick>Shadow Strike. I've seen many players who panic and CC break the Spinning Kick knockdown, which I immediately follow with Stun. Even if they don't, that's a few seconds they aren't hitting you back. After that opening combo, I do the standard Breach>Project>2x Clairvoyant Strike>filler>Project>Low Slash>Shadow Strike>Spinning Strike (if below 30%). Bear in mind, you'll have a harder time bursting down other Assassins and Shadows or Scouperative healers. QQ moar.

This is a very interesting hybrid and I might give it a try in PvP soon. I'd like to make a suggestion though: Instead of Keep Cool and Sedatives in the healing tree, take Prognosis: Critical and Patient Studies. This will help you regen energy more reliably with Diagnostic Scan instead of having to wait on Cool Head to come off CD.

I've played all 3 healing classes very often in pvp and have tried to learn what debuff can be cleansed by whom. Here's a list of what I believe constitutes the various types: Bleeds like Vital Shot (GS) and the Annhi Mara's bleed effects can be universally cleansed. Burns like those of Watchman Sent can be universally cleansed. Memorize their debuff icons, because all debuffs with those icons can be cleansed regardless of the class applying them. They are all physical effects. Roots/Slows from Smuggler/IA and Trooper/BH can be cleansed by tech healers, ie: Merc/Commando and Scouperatives. They are tech effects. I am not entirely sure if the Sage/Sorc knockback root can be cleansed by force healers, but force-induced slows (Force Slow - Consular/Inquisitor) can be cleansed by force healers. Special abilities of tech classes like Sab Charge (GS) and Incendiary Round (Commando) can only be cleansed by tech healers. Certain tech abilities like Contingency Charges from the Saboteur tree in GS and Sticky Grenade (Commando) are not removable and hence, cannot be cleansed. Special abilities and DoTs of force classes like Mind Crush (sage) and Weaken Mind (Sage) can only be cleansed by force healers, ie: Sage/Sorc. They classify as force effects. Stealth saps are mental effects and can be cleansed Mezzes like Flash Grenade and Awe (Knight) can be cleansed. Hard stuns cannot be cleansed. SPECULATION: I don't remember whether or not I've tried this, but I am assuming that CC abilities like Force Lift and Concussion Round classify as physical/mental effects and can be cleansed. I haven't seen too many uses of these abilities in WZs to remember if I've tried cleansing them. Bear in mind, I discovered all of this over the course of playing my healers. If there's more or if I'm mistaken about something, a more knowledgeable player is welcome to pitch in. Let me know if you find this list helpful and you want me to go further in depth. I'll try to make a list of all cleansable abilities by each healing class.