As the OP stated, PvP set bonuses are necessary for the best gear on various classes. Due to this issue, players from the time of his post going forward are stuck at a disadvantage compared to those who started earlier. More importantly, the need for PvE players to do PvP in order to get the correct shells/armorings is unnecessary in the first place. Many players dislike PvP, which creates problems of its own if they feel forced into doing so just to get what they need in PvE. A similar problem occurred with Relics where the best ones required PvP and fixing it here would help the community as it did there. To resolve this issue, I have two possible solutions. 1) Allows players the ability to change between set bonuses I don't know the difficulty of this, but if it's possible, this would probably be the optimal solution. Essentially, players would be able to choose which set bonus they want from their gear through an in-game option (like a clickable toggle) once they have any of the current shells/armorings that provide them. This allows players the ability to quickly experiment and mix various bonuses for their class and gives them the freedom to wear any shells they prefer for the sake of appearance. 2) Make Recruit gear give out PvP bonuses Players reaching 50 now get almost a complete set of Tionese gear, which gives them the PvE set bonuses for their class, but the PvP Recruit gear does not. Since Recruit gear can be purchased with credits, this allows players to buy the shell to use for the set bonus. As noted by the OP, though, Campaign and Dread Guard armorings do take precedence so players would need to use crafted armorings to fill those slots. Another disadvantage of this is that players who want to optimize their gear would have to wear Recruit gear, while I think many people would like to use whatever shells they prefer for a particular appearance.

I got a parse with my Juggernaut this time. (1805 DPS) - Vengeance (4/31/6) http://www.torparse.com/a/106176/time/1358733616/1358733917/0/Overview Unfortunately, this character is not a biochem so I wasn't using any adrenals, though, I did have an exotech might stim. As with my operative, I'm mostly 61 with some 63s (mainly the mainhand hilt and off-hand armoring + some Initiative Enhancements). Also, I want to point out that what the person above that said the parses you see here are not super realistic is spot-on. I know for myself, the two parses I've shown are lucky ones where I got crits on the right skills and lucky procs on my resets. So while I've done a little over 1800 DPS over 5 minutes or more with both my operative and my juggernaut, a more normal parse is around 1700-1750 for either one.

Hey, this is a parse for my operative. (1805 DPS) - Concealment (3/31/7) http://www.torparse.com/a/97764/time/1357989708/1357990075/0/Overview I'm a biochem so I'm using the rakata skill stim + adrenals. Most of my gear is made up of 61s with some 63s scattered around (notably both barrels and 3 initiative enhancements).

You are partially correct in that Enraged Defense is not a skill to be used in general for tanking, but it is good for DPS specs. However, it is quite useful even as a tank in particular situations, especially if you are a hybrid. The best time to use this skill is when the entire team is taking unavoidable raid-wide damage,when you won't have any trouble holding threat, and you have extra rage to burn. Here are some examples of when to use Enraged Defense. 1) The red circle phase of Zorn and Toth 2) The Lightning Field pulse from Heriad, Ciphas, and Kel'Sara 3) This is a bit risky, but using it when holding Kel'Sara until the other Dreadguards are dead (since no one else should be touching her) 4) The last phase of Kephess the Undying when you are dodging orange circles for the team 5) During the Scream from Terror from Beyond when you are holding him